Hey all,

Was catching up on some maintenance on the RDX (oil, filter, tire rotation every 6K) and when I went to reset the maintenance minder, I found it calling for B6, which is a rear diff fluid change. To do the work is no biggie, but at 12K miles??? My wife drives the car mostly and isn’t a stoplight racer, so for the life of me I can’t understand why there would be such a short interval on the rear diff, unless it’s a special factory fill for break in.

I also realized I never reset MM after my oil change at 6K, and the car says I’m a few hundred overdue for oil… so, a 2020 RDX seems to need engine oil and rear diff at the same interval? That’s just whack!

Has anyone else gotten this code so early, and if so, have any insight as to why the interval is so short? I’m a cynic and can’t help but wonder if this is Honda’s way of driving up easy revenue for their service departments, the job looks stupid simple! Thanks!

 

Welp, next time I’ll search the other forums before posting. Some suggested posts in the other forums discuss this same issue. Only debate appears to be if it’s for revenue or truly needed. Who knows. Guess I’ll go buy some fluid.

 

First one is around 15k miles, so its correct. And then its every 30k after. Its been like that since Acura started making SH-AWD, the first one is needed to remove shavings.
The MID tries to bundle services together, so if you are due for an oil change and its close to 15k, it will want you to do rear diff. All this is normal.

 

Yes, the Acura fluid changes, all of them, are vastly sooner than our BMW. Is BMW's fluid that much better, are BMW parts that much higher quality that they don't need the fluid 'new' that often, or is Acura just looking for a revenue source and we are just dumping fluids down the drain.

 

you seem very sensitive about fluids lol
honda and acuras do the lower mile flush for the intital one as a proactive measure. All systems are different and then the next fluid flushes are at higher intervals

also if u compare a high mile honda to a high mile bmw the repair costs will be about 2x more

people who complain on small cost routine maint pay for it in the end

 

Curious if BMW still gives owners a firm maintenance schedule, or if they’ve also moved on to this computer determined (possibly arbitrary?) maintenance.

It wouldn’t have changed our mind in buying the RDX, but it would’ve been nice to know that a brand new Acura will start nickel and diming you a bit sooner than generations prior. I’ve purchased Honda products all my life in part because these vehicles generally require very little preventative maintenance compared to peer offerings.

If they just published a ******* maintenance schedule I would’ve had the fluid on hand to do when I did the oil and tires. THAT annoys me the most!

 

Maybe BMW needs to take a lesson from Acura and decrease their fluid intervals? Not sure if it’s still true these days but when one of those cars (or Audi/Mercedes to be fair) hits 100K most owners ditch them…

 

30k interval seems like a good one for rear-differential fluid. I am changing mine every 15k miles because it only cost me me under $30

 

Good call. I’ve been suspicious for years of the motives behind all the auto manufacturers extending service intervals on wear fluids. Surely they won’t stop publishing common sense black and white maintenance schedules so we can take care of our major investment… oh wait they did exactly that!

Our RDX didn’t ask for oil until 12K which I find preposterous. Hence my surprise they wanted rear diff fluid so soon.

 

At least Acura still has transmission fluid changes at around 60K... Lexus/Toyota came up with life-time ATF fluid BS, people still change it, but many Lexus dealers refuse to do it,
The reason for pushing out maintenance to longer intervals is competition, when people shop they look at things like 5 or 10 year cost of ownership, so they like to squeeze it to make it look cheap.

 

When we took our 2006 LR3 (around 105K miles) in a couple years ago to the LR dealer to see what a transmission fluid change would cost, they wouldn't do it. I believe the schedule showed 100K miles for it to be done, but they told me that changing the fluid in an older, higher mileage vehicle can cause problems that weren't there to begin with. What do I know...but if the dealer did not want to take my money, so be it. But I agree with the 'do it early' comment. Our BMW had a 15K interval for engine oil, and there was no way I would let an engine go that long. As it was, we did it at 7,500 miles, and that still seemed like a lot of miles.

 

One thing to remember ... auto manufacturers are in the business of selling you new automobiles every few years ... they're not environmental activists, no matter how much they say they care about it, and the profit they make off fluids are peanuts compared to actual cars. Take what you will from that information. /tinfoilhatoff