Accord Diesel impressions

[Richard B]

Hi folks.

I drove a 1994 Accord VTI wagon for ten years. This car is still going, but things were starting to wear out to the extent of almost being on a first name basis with Eric the Car Guy..

Owning this car was turning into one of those 'cold dead hands' scenarios, with people increasingly asking me if I was ever going to upgrade to something newer, and I would reply that there simply wasn't anything on the market that I liked as much as the Accord wagon. But you know, working air-con was ancient history, the radio let its smoke out a few years ago, and I didn't mind, because I never used those things anyway.. but driving started to feel like a bit of a compromise except on winding country roads, where the suspension and the vtec engine still made for a pretty enjoyable ride.

I never liked the Odyssey as a wagon alternative. I mainly move stuff, not people, so I was kind of resigned to swapping to an Octavia, A4, Liberty or Mazda 6 wagon, when an imported N22A Tourer popped up for sale in QLD.

Long story short, the car is now registered in NSW, which was a PITA as "AU compliance" does not necessarily mean "NSW Legal", and half the insurance companies don't want to touch cars "not designed for Australian conditions". It took a few weeks before it was all done.

Buying something that has no support base in Australia is of course a risk, but I am a pretty competent mechanic, and the car bits are mostly standard Euro. The wagon specific parts can be found in NZ, and the diesel specific bits in the UK & Germany.

I've already had my nose rubbed in it though. It turns out the car has the common i-CTDi ailment of a split exhaust manifold weld, and I had to order the parts from the UK. Still waiting for those. The previous owner also let the brakes go a bit more than I would have, and I am currently trying to source new brake rotors locally. But brake part numbers from Europe and Australia are all over the shop and I'm not buying these at Honda prices. The 0W-30 engine oil Honda recommends is neigh impossible to find in Australia. 5W-30 will have to do. 0W is supposed to use less fuel.

Driving:
I was sort of expecting there to be some translation from the 5th gen wagon to this 7th gen.. But it feels like a different car. It's definitely heavier and less nimble. Then of course going from a petrol VTI 4 speed auto to a manual 6 speed diesel, the brain-embedded exhaust note and torque curve lookup tables have to be un-learned. The engine will happily do 60 in 4 different gears, and whilst 1st gear is a bit short, the rest of the range makes much better use of the low end torque.

Pro's:
- it's pretty much top spec euro; leather everything, electric everything. The car is solid and comfortable. Good feedback from the road. easy to park for a car this size. Excellent fuel economy. Load space is massive with that straight down Odyssey like back door. Sunroof is great for those not-quite-aircon days. The 13 year old N22 engine design is pretty high tech still.

Con's:
- Heavy clutch makes Sydney traffic a bit bothersome. None of our phones connect to the bluetooth (The unit is probably busted), The steering feels less precise than the Gen 5, The Gen 8 wagon went back to a slanted back door and looks soooo much better. The engine sounds a bit truck-like / clattery mechanical from the outside, and why the hell did they put such a dorky exhaust on the wagon while the rest of the range got that sexy twin pipe? No one seems to make a legally acquirable service manual for the N22A.

To do:
- Figure out if anyone else owns one in AU. Find an AU satnav DVD for less than what Honda thinks it's worth, or make the satnav screen do something else useful. Fix the Bluetooth module. Install twin exhaust pipes. New headlights. Find a tow bar for it. Make the car last at least ten years!

Cheers

Richard B.

[antony]

Where was the car from,UK or Ireland ,being right hand drive ?

This is the CL9 Euro wagon...they are great.

I saw a Navy one recently in Melbourne...

[Richard B]

Yes that's the one. I can't tie this down exactly, but I think the production line for the wagon / estate / tourer is in actually Japan.

Besides that, it is a UK import. Speedo and odometer are in MPH. (with a secondary scale in km.h underneath). It was brought in as a personal import by the previous owner.

Was the one you saw in Melbourne a Diesel? The petrol version was available in New Zealand (and I think Japan also) but the Honda diesels seemed to have skipped the AU NZ and US markets until 2014.

This was apparently because when Honda introduced the N22 engine, they didn't have a compatible automatic gearbox available. But more likely it was that they couldn't get the price of such a package + service network down enough to compete with Mazda, Ford & VW. In Europe & Brexitania you lose half your sales if you don't field a diesel, and automatics are still seen as a bit of a luxury - even though that is changing rapidly with modern fuel efficient automatics.

[Richard B]

btw this is the car (click for larger)

[antony]

I'm not sure if it was a diesel or not,it passed by so quickly.
Yours is great looking ,I'm sure you'll love it.

[Richard B]

A few months later..

Still busy getting to know the oddities of this car. Still discovering bits of wear and tear from the previous ten years, realising there are parts missing, or simply not bolted down.

Just can't get used to the MPH speedo, so started using an old phone as a GPS speedo. I had one with a tiny screen which fits neatly into an unimportant part of the readouts. Just have to figure out how to permanently power it without looking like a physics experiment.

Major item fixed so far is the exhaust manifold, which was cracked and required replacement. Following that and an oil and coolant refresh, started paying attention to fuel economy.

Running 0w-30 Penrite (non-DPF variety), am getting a city / freeway average of 4.7L/100km. Less than half of what my previous car used, driving the same speeds.


For shits'ngiggles, the last 5 miles back from the local service station(Faulconbridge to Blaxland) the internal MPG indicator sat on 100MPG (it does not go any higher). Straight run, mostly downhill, dead of night, braked only once.