Odometer Woes

November 4, 2005 8:28 AM

My odometer just gave up. Should I pay the money the Honda guy wants?

My odometer on my 99 Civic LX is stuck on 71999. Trip odometer isn't working either. My usual garage won't touch it... they mumbled something about calling Honda. There's a specialized garage in town that will repair it for 261 dollars all total. Unless it's "the other problem", then it's more expensive. Although they said the check engine light would be on if it was the other problem.

So, should I just suck it up and pay the 260 bucks to repair a part that doesn't even do anything? I is broke.I mean, obviously if I ever want to sell the car I should do this Am I getting ripped off?

posted by selfnoise to travel & transportation (17 comments total)

a part that doesn't even do anything

Until you want to sell the car, and the buyer wants to know how many miles are on it.

Odometer fraud in Google. Playing around with odometers is a sensitive subject, I can see where a mechanic might get twitchy about the suggestion.
posted by gimonca at 8:32 AM on November 4, 2005

I'm not sure what you mean by getting ripped off in this context. Are you asking 'Is $261 more than this part and the labour to install it are worth?' or are you asking 'Is the recommendation to repair something that's not actually vital to the function of the car just an attempt to get me to spend money?'

I wonder what the legalities of a broken odomoter are, given the illegality of setting them back before sale.
posted by jacquilynne at 8:41 AM on November 4, 2005

This is probably the most poorly worded askme post I've ever made. Sorry.

1. I want to repair it. If nothing else, I'm kinda anal and a counter like that not working will DRIVE ME INSANE.

2. I'm wondering if the price is reasonable.

3. I'm wondering if there's some other method to try that might cost less.
posted by selfnoise at 8:45 AM on November 4, 2005

How are you going to be able to tell a prospective buyer the correct milage for the vehicle, if you don't get that part replaced or repaired?
posted by veedubya at 8:45 AM on November 4, 2005

When my spedometer stopped working property, they had to replace the whole thing, odometer and all. I got one from another car, with similar milage (~10k miles less, IIRC).

I wish I could remember how much it cost me...
posted by delmoi at 9:00 AM on November 4, 2005

Does the speedometer still work?
posted by DandyRandy at 9:00 AM on November 4, 2005

I think it's worth it because not only do you want a repair, you want an authoritative repair. A Honda with that sort of mileage on it has 1) a lot of life left in it and 2) a good resale value. If the car had, say, three times as many miles on it, it would have a much lower resale value. Also, it's important to know how many miles your car has on it because it will need a new timing belt in ~18K miles and if you miss that by 10K miles it could be a mess. So, I'd suck up the $261 or call a few more places to get estimates, but odometers are one of the few things I'd say to not screw around on getting repaired properly by people with a worth-a-damn reputation.
posted by jessamyn at 9:01 AM on November 4, 2005

My speedometer broke too on my Grand Jeep Cherokee. Parts and labor totalled $800 or so. Consider yourself lucky.
posted by geoff. at 9:09 AM on November 4, 2005

How are you going to be able to tell a prospective buyer the correct milage for the vehicle, if you don't get that part replaced or repaired?

Last time I transferred title on a car, there was a checkbox for "The odometer reading is known not to be correct because the odometer is broken."

It'll probably wreak havoc on your resale value though.
posted by kindall at 9:24 AM on November 4, 2005

Speedometers for your Civic range from $20-90 on Ebay. If you're handy with a screwdriver and have access to a service manual, I'd venture to guess you could do the swap yourself.
posted by SteveInMaine at 9:43 AM on November 4, 2005

Okay, I feel bad for bitching about this now. Thanks, everyone, I'll take it in and pay the Honda god, who I imagine sitting in a cloud and yelling "OWNED!" every so often.
posted by selfnoise at 10:43 AM on November 4, 2005

Wait 2 years and then when you sell it, it will have fewer miles. :)
posted by eas98 at 11:01 AM on November 4, 2005

Getting the dash off will be the hardest part of the install, and it will be a bitch if you've never done any work to the car. $260 is not unreasonable, and ditto what Jess said about having a "Honda-authorized" stamp of approval. Anything else and I'd say no one will ever care or notice, but really, it's not that bad.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 11:04 AM on November 4, 2005

I find it hard to believe that Portland, ME has no independent Speedometer Shop that wouldn't do the job for much less.
posted by Kwantsar at 12:53 PM on November 4, 2005

This happened to my 94 Accord a few years ago. When they replaced it, they just put in a new kit. Driving around after that, it was a bit odd to see that I only had 27 miles or whatever on such an old car. I can check my records re: cost, but it's definitely something you want fixed, for the reasons jessamyn and others noted. Also, the mechanic probably won't do anything to note the previous mileage anywhere in the car itself, so make sure you keep a record of what it was stuck on and inform prospective buyers when you sell it, otherwise you could be held liable for fraud.
posted by kyleg at 1:54 PM on November 4, 2005

I had this happen on my 90 Accord as well. (The spedometer stopped working part of the time, and therefore the odometer stopped working...I had the check engine light problem too.) I think it cost about that much to get it fixed, so you are not getting ripped off. The only way to go cheaper is get a used ...thing...(which I have no idea what it is called, or if yours is even the same problem), but then that could crap out too and it's not that much cheaper. So I would also agree that it's worth it...I definitely got freaked out when I had no idea how fast I was going and was very happy to have it fixed.
posted by jetskiaccidents at 2:34 PM on November 4, 2005

actually it's quite easy to go cheaper with a brand new "thing" -- it's always worth it to see if you can buy the oem part, and pay the garage for labor only.

there are more than a few authorized honda oem part sellers online (and you can also try to go through local honda dealerships) -- wish I could help more, but I've not had my honda for about 5 years now (which, oddly enough, is about the same time hondaparts.com, my favorite oem parts source, shut down for whatever reason)

you might want to poke around on a couple honda enthusiast sites/forums, and see what the latest well-liked parts dealer is.

also, as someone who did most of the work on my dear departed prelude, I totally agree that taking the dash off is one annoying bitch of an experience.
posted by dorian at 8:53 PM on November 4, 2005