Fellow newsgroup citizens, we used to be a (nearly) all Honda family - 3
Hondas and 1 classic VW Beetle (1965). On our earlier Hondas I replaced
timing belts, entire engines, and some other parts myself. Now, however,
the 2 remaining Honda cars I and my in-laws have seem to reflect a
company that has lost its way. Since these are 2002 and 2003 Models
(Civic and Accord, respectively) I wanted to get some feedback as to
whether things have gotten back on track. Here are my observations
based on the 2 Hondas we have:

1) there seem to be some design weaknesses which are common across the
platforms. Maybe while trying to be light weight (and less expensive?)
they made things less durable. One example is the steering rack. Both
cars had to have the rack replaced (Accord at 90k miles and Civic and
134k miles). Both developed oil leaks that took about $600 to track
down/fix - oil pump seals, oil pan seal, and some things on top of the
motor even though when the timing belt was replaced all seals, including
valve cover seal were replace by the dealer.

2) The Hondas are even less easy to work on yourself. The oil filter is
very hard to reach. On Civics there is very little room for standard
wrenches if you want to do engine work. I compared that with Hyundai
cars where the Hyundai frames even have indentations which coincide with
where your hand would travel when turning a wrench when replacing a
timing belt, oil filter is down low where it is easy to reach, etc.

3) The parts are expensive and the engineering is a bit too complex (so
more things to go wrong).

From what I have heard from some Toyota owners that brand seems to have
also lost its way and has been cutting corners on part/design quality to
keep costs down. So do you folks think that the current (newer) crop of
Hondas have found their stride and are again great cars or are they not
as great as they used to be in the '80's and '90's?

Thanks!

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