2000 Acura Tl

We bought my brother in laws 3.2 TL. The shop wanted $1300 to do the motor vehicle inspection (MVI) and I wasn't having it. Its one thing if there was $1300 worth of work that needed to be done but they were over charging for the work. 1.75 hours to do one strut? Come on now. What mechanic is going to take almost 2 hours to do a strut? It down take that long. They wanted 45 minutes for each link kit that needed to be installed. It is two bolts not counting the 5 bolts to remove the wheel. I'm willing to pay a fair price but that wasn't a fair quote. It also has a sticky emergency brake.

I got mad and decided to do it myself. The only thing I didn't feel like taking on was the emergency brake cable.

I tackled the strut first. I had the strut off in about 15 mins. I compressed the spring but was having an issue with the bolt. I didn't have all of my tools with me so I decided to see if I could save a bit of time and I ran down to a local shop and it was closed. Went to the next and they were closed but I knew a guy there so he used the air tools to rip that off and put the new strut together. I stayed and talked for about 15 minutes then went back to install it. The drive is close to 10 minutes each way. I had to wait 20 minutes for a car to use to drive down there. With all of that messing around I still had the strut on in less then 2 hours. I had about 30-40 minutes actual working time. Explain the 1.75 hour quote again?

The link kits were next. The first side took about 30-45 minutes to do. The reason was I forgot a couple of tools home and we had to find some of my father in laws tools. The next side took 15 minutes since I had all of the tools right there and some new tricks.

So I ended up spending an evening working on the car and saving $410 + tax.

Now I just need to get the emergency brake cable and mvi done and she is read to roll.

I will post the pictures in the next thread so nothing happens that causes me to have to type this all again.

James

 

James

 

Later on I need to work on cleaning up the rust. I want to clean it up and paint it. I want to paint the calipers as well.

James

 

Looks like my work isn't done. Today I need to do an inner tie rod end. Borrowed a tie rod removal tool from a parts store loan a tool program so it should be much easier then the one I did years ago without one. I will have some pictures of this later on.

James

 

I got a great family rate on the car. I do want to clean up a lot of the rust.

James

 

Did the inner tie rod yesterday. It went really well.

My daughter took this picture of me. LOL



James

 

Here is the part installed.





I thought I took pictures of everything reinstalled but I guess I didn't. Now the car just needs to go in for an alignment and everything should be good to go.

James

 

Here is an old pic of the car.



James

 

Welcome to Gearhead Central @ValiantPoe.

Thanks. I will work on almost anything. As far as the you can't go wrong with the Honda, I don't feel that way. I know many people that have had problems. All brands break but it is a nice car. Drove it from Halifax to Saskatoon. It was great.

James

 

I knew the car was getting close to needed new brakes. I was hoping to wait a couple of more weeks but my rear brakes started getting noisy. I was hoping to just have to do pads and rotors but was worried that I might have to do a caliper on the drivers side. Turns out that was ok. Sweet. Get to the passenger side...Caliper is bad. So I had to call my wife to see if she could grab me one while she was out.

Here are the pictures. Next month I will work on the front brakes.



James

 

I forgot a couple of pictures.



James

 

The fun never stops. Last night while going home from work my steroids and dash started cutting in and out. The gages would shut down then come on again. After a while they turned right off.

I put the meter on it and it is weak. So it looks like that is my project for tonight. This one will be a slight pain because of the location but I should be able to get it out. The worst part might be putting the bolts back in. That didn't seem like it was a concern when they built the engine.

James

 

Well, after working 11 hours, I came home and replaced the alternator. I would like to have a private conversation with the Honda engineer that decided to put the alternator in that location. Its like p utting with a volley ball. Let me see if I have the energy to upload some pictures.

James

 

Here are the pictures.

Below is the torture chamber. Honda calls it an engine bay. We will agree to disagree.



On the left side you see the alternator. You can see that I'm unbolting the wire from the alternator.



If you look closely, you will see my 14 mm wrench on the one of the two mounting bolts. This one is tight. I can make 15 degree turns with the wrench. That added to a long bolt means a pain in the....



I had to move the power steering resovior to make some room to get that damn thing out. It was tight. I had to move a lot of things around to get it out.



That is the hole it had to come out of.



Me having all kinds of fun. I still have my work coveralls on. Oh, did I mention it started to rain a bit a couple of times while working on it. It also got dart just as I got home. Makes for a fun job.



Putting things back together. It went in a lot easier then it came out.



And she is making power again. I was getting about 10.5 when I checked it last night. Just enough to get me home, without any gauges or anything.



Tomorrow I want to see what it would have cost if I would have paid to have it done. The part was $194 after the core charge. Took me about an hour and a half. Not bad when I had to walk back to my garage more then a few times to get more tools.

James+

 

Well I had the winter tires installed. Turns out that the car needs even more work then I thought. So I really need to replace it now. So now I need to look for a Jeep TJ.

James

 

Welcome to Gearhead Central @jbeavis100

Its a about 14 model years old. So that is just basic maintenance. If a shop did the work it would have all been expensive but not with me doing the work.

Here is a list of the parts and prices that I remember.

• The Alternator was less then $200.
  
• Back brakes were $120-150.
• Then I needed the caliper which was about $80.
  
• Link kit was about $40-60.
• I think the inner tie rod was around $100.
• Strut was $80-120
• Windshield $230 or so
• Winter tires $220 I think for them used.

Plus the strut, link kit and windshield were all part of the deal when I bought the car so I haven't spent much on it all together. As cars age you have to put money in them. That is just life. That is what you have to decide when buying a car.

Do I buy new, have warranty and a set monthly cost for repairs? (not counting brakes and tires and so on)

Do I get a car a couple of years old, get a good savings over new and still have a little warranty left to protect you for the first little while?

Do I get an older car, save money on car payments but possibly spend more on repairs?

Now with this car it will need some other things so at this point I will not be keeping they car past next year. If everything works out I will replace it in the spring or summer. It will have to be gone by November at the latest. But as far as what is in this thread, this isn't bad at all.

James