I have an 04 acura TL with 55k miles. the car was great to me until I was driving on the NJ turnpike and my car stalled out in the toll booth. i was able to start it up again and move it to a safe area. I looked under the hood and saw there was smoke coming out of the coolant reservoir, the temp gauge was up but not over heating and my check engine light was blinking. I also noticed there was still some liquid still in the reservoir slightly above the minimum mark. The car was able to start but was really shaky and bad smelling so I had the car towed to the dealership. Upon dropping it off the service rep told me there was no coolant at all in the car, which i though was weird because i noticed liquid in the reservoir when i broke down, had the oil changed about 2500 miles ago at a local shop where i asked them to check the fluids, and even put a little coolant in about a week ago because the level was slightly above minimum. The next day i received a call from the service rep telling me that since the car overheated the entire engine needed to be replaced and it would cost 7500$ and was not covered under the 75k powertrain warranty and my 50k mile warranty expired and it was my responsibility to maintain the car. Even though i thought i had been.

The car always ran great, there were no service indicators on the dash except that the oil was at 20% , the only problem i recently noticed was the AC sometimes blowing out warm air and the exaust fan staying on for a few extra mins after the car was shut off, but didnt think anything of it becuase the weather has been really hot. Being that the car can speak to me, i would think it would give me some type of warning sign before the engine was on the verge of breaking. Any advice will be extremely helpful. i do not know what to do.

 

The car is also still under lease for another 13 months. Thanks for the help guys

 

ok- so you had been losing coolant for at least a little while that you know of.
And the temp guage started running over the halfway mark?

Did the dealer say what caused the overheat?
They need to know if the radiator has a hole or what - so they fix the problem not just result
There is no scheduled maitenance to the cooling system yet with your miles/year-
what maitenance do they claim you neglected?

so there had to be a part failure- maybe the water pump?
Which would be a warranty issue!
Speak ONLY with the Service MANAGER and ask what failed
Mention how the service writer BLAMED you and would Acura be interested in this?

The service writers and techs are often commi$$ion oriented in their diagnosis,
and sometimes ~forget~ what is warranty and extended warranty and...

If not covered repair- look in the phone book and call shops that specialize in rebuilding engines and get a good job and for much le$$- when the lease ends- turn it in.
Why should you give the dealer a fresh motor???
- but dont exchange the engine with a used one- the serial numbers wont match the paper for the car and they will charge you for an engine!!

 

Unfortunately the overflow tank won't tell you how much coolant you actually have it there's a problem in the system. Only taking the cap off the radiator which they recommend against will tell you. Either way, an engine should never use coolant. Something happened to make the coolant go away.

If the AC was blowing hot and the car overheated, the only thing that links the two together is the secondary fan not coming on. The computer may also have a protection that won't let the AC come on if the engine is overheating or near overheating.

Most factory dummy guages (without numbers) are far from linear. To get it to move past the normal range usually requires a big temp change. Mine stays exactly the same from winter time to the Vegas/Phoenix summer with AC going. These cars don't have overheating issues if everything is working right.

 

you hate cars? what are you.....a caveman?

 

i didnt think the car was losing coolant, i just assumed when it was low that the place i got the oil change from was just lazy and didnt do it. He said what caused the overheat was that there was no coolant and that it was my responsibility to put coolant in the car, and then also brought up the fact that i have only brought my car to that particular acura dealership once, so later today i tried to get the car towed out of there and to somewhere else to get a second opinion and they told me they cant do anything because there is a balance of 400 something dollars for parts, even though i didnt sign a repair order or even give oral consent and i have to wait until monday until my service writer is in

 

very stressful...espcially when your rent a car is a ford focus

 

Sorry to hear about this, but the cooling fan running when you shut the car off should have been a major sign of your car beginning to over heat, You should have payed more attention to the temperature gauge thats pretty much your warning sign. Well if you can talk to the dealer maybe they could help you out. It probably would help if youve done all of your vehicles services there, they might consider goodwilling or helping you out with the repairs. If the dealer wont do anything there is always the choice of going through your insurance company!

 

When you have your car towed to the shop you give implied consent to inspect the car- usually 1.5 hours- the same as diagnostics fee they put on work order when you take it in for trans failure.
$400 in parts? to tell you its ben overheated?
Sounds like you better prepare for battle on this one- no parts required to inspect
and they still have to tell you WHY the overheating occured
Then we are back to the warranty issue.
The service writer is a punk- deal only with MANAGER and be writing all this down to mail and call Acura with. Something failed on your car to make it overheat

As for those with rock steady temp regardless of conditions- congrats- you're car works perfect- just like most of us!

 

It is not normal for coolant to be added to the overflow bottle- that should move fluid back and forth between the radiator and bottle as needed with heat changes.

Any loss of fluid is cause for concern
Lost all the coolant- something is leaking big time!

 

Warranty does not care if you took your car to every dealer across the state for services, nor that you ever went to a dealer-what kind of BS is this person giving you?

Warranty coverage: thats its all about receipts for oil and filter purchases- thats all you need to be covered- and no oil failure so not an issue here

I am sittng here in disbelief of the service writers statement of its your job to keep fluid in the car

Check you receipt from last oil change and see if they noted any coolant loss then
ask anyone who I have been a consumer advocate for- if what the dealer says means anything in the end-
over limit for trans ? not with my math you're not!!

 

The turbo car in sig has at times made me hate cars since I was 17. It's a love-hate relationship.

 

2 questions:
1 Were you waiting in line to pay your toll?
2. Did you tell the Acura dealer that the fan had been running after the car was shut off and you a/c was getting warm( at idle I presume) ?
The reason I ask this is because it sounds like your temp sensor went bad and was causing the fans not to come on, thus resulting it the car running hot. The Fan is not supposed to run once the car is turned off. This is a sign of a bad sensor. I know that on some older Hondas it was normal for the fan to run after shut down but the TL is NOT supposed to run after shut down.
I also cannot believe that you need an entire engine. I would think that you should only need new head gaskets or new heads at the worst. You need to aks them if there was coolant in the oil. If so you may need an engine.
$400 dollars in parts is crazy for a "diagnosis"and I think they are ripping you off. This should be a warranty issue and they need to tell you what went wrong.

 

Ive seen my service manager at my honda dealership try to cover things like this under goodwill warranty with ok from the honda rep, or try to help the customer out with the repairs, if the owner has had their services done at the dealer, bought the car from the dealer, how many honda's they have owned. Especially a car just out of factory warranty. The reason for this is customer loyalty, by trying to get the customer to buy another honda in the future. Not too sure what kind of asshole dealerships you people are dealing with, but down here where i am at they try to cover most things under warranty or goodwill lots of jobs to get good customer surveys, and in hoping that they will buy another vehicle from them in the future!

 

yes, you need to get in touch with your AREA Warranty Rep and discuss a goodwill motor replacment with you possibly only paying the labor. I had this done with a Civic transmission which was also around 5-10K miles out of warranty. The dealer is only concerned with labor where Acura/Honda provides parts.

good luck. ONLY SPEAK TO THE MANAGERS AND ASK FOR THE AREA REPS #. If you cant get it go to a competing dealer and ask them for it...

 

yes i was in line paying the toll and i did not tell the dealer about the fan because i forgot about it until now. thanks for all the help everyone.

 

bh
the fan does run a few minutes after shutdown when needed,
more than that indicates a problem

ryno
what did they say about actual cause of failure?

 

They told me there was a leak in the radiataor which caused the overheat. I spoke with an acura consumer rep and they told me there is nothing i can do since it wasnt under warranty, reguardless if i put coolant in it or not. they said if even a rock or something damaged the radiator hours before i broke down they still wouldnt be able to do anything because the vehicle is out of warranty and i should have noticed the temp gauge rising. My insurance company does not cover mechanical breakdown either, so i dont know where to go from here

 

Wow its kind of hard to believe that they wont cover your car just 5k miles out of warranty or even help you out! You might want to try calling local junkyards for a salvaged motor if you cant afford to buy a new motor, the dealer i work at will do this at customers request. Well there isnt much more advise i can think of, goodluck in getting your car back on the road.

 

OP cant swap the motor- leased car- all part numbers must match when returned

 

if anyone cares i found a place to put a new engine in for 5k. i am probably going to just buy the car out at the end of the lease. theres no reason to give a car back with an engine with 15k miles on it

 

Did they ever find the reason the car lost it's coolant?

 

So I guess what the OP says is that since his car is at 55k miles, the "bumper-to-bumper" warranty is out of effect but the powertrain warranty is still in effect. However, apparently radiator hoses are not officially part of the "powertrain", is that correct? I'm actually pretty sure that hoses are not covered by the powertrain warranty. So the dealership is within their rights to deny warranty coverage for the service.

Coolant temperature is regulated by a mechanical thermostat. That's why the guage will quickly reach the half-way mark, then stop. The thermostat is normally closed, then the engine quickly heats up, the thermostat opens, and the coolant flows in a controlled manner to keep the engine at a constant temperature. Even the SLIGHTEST hint of engine temperature increase (according to the gauge) indicates that the thermostat is wide-open and the coolant system is unable to provide enough cooling capacity, which is never normal. That is, it doesn't have to get into the red to indicate a problem. The fact that your cooling fan was running more than normal should have also been an indication.

 

Edit by Admin Ron A:

I deleted the text and sent you an email with an explanation.

 

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