DEAD BATTERY......again!!

[YellowViperGTS]

Anyone else REALLY annoyed by the fact that there is no automatic shutoff for the interior lights when they are accidentally left on??
I hate to tell you how many times we have had to jump start our Odyssey in the morning - thank goodness for the new high-tech battery pack jumpers!
We would be very interested to hear from anyone who has successfully hacked a relay to shut off the interior lights after, say 15 minutes.
Thanks!

[lorunner]

Originally Posted by YellowViperGTS

Anyone else REALLY annoyed by the fact that there is no automatic shutoff for the interior lights when they are accidentally left on??
I hate to tell you how many times we have had to jump start our Odyssey in the morning - thank goodness for the new high-tech battery pack jumpers!
We would be very interested to hear from anyone who has successfully hacked a relay to shut off the interior lights after, say 15 minutes.
Thanks!

when you leave the house do you forget to shut the front door probablky not so when you leave the car turn the interior light switch off.

[mwkirchner]

The following comments are not meant to point the finger at the original poster ... just some stuff I would like to vent about.

I work at a Honda dealership and we hear stories like the first post all too often.

I feel this way ... some people should not be allowed to buy a car. They do not have the mentality to own something like that. You should have to take some kind of test and pass it BEFORE you are allowed to buy one. I also feel that hoods should have locks on them and the consumer should not be given a key until AFTER they pass a test.

Just today we had a lady come in complaining about her CRV. She said the high beams did not work properly. I got into it and tried them and they worked EXACTLY like they should. She got all upset with me saying that she is not stupid and she knows for a fact that they do not. So ... I take her out to the car and on the way I mention that it is always a good idea to read through the OWNER'S MANUAL to familiarize yourself with the operation of items in a vehicle. She assured me that she did indeed read it ... front to back. I proceded to have her sit in the CRV and show me what the problem was that she was having. The CRV is a new 2004. For those of you not familiar with the newer Hondas ... the high beam switch is no longer pulled straight back to activate the high beams and then back again to return to low beams. You now PUSH the turn signal lever FORWARD to get the high beams to stay on. Pulling back only flashes them. This is what she was doing. I reached in and PUSHED the lever forward and lo and behold they stayed on. She said she had never seen anything like that in all her years of owning cars. I then said ... maybe you should read through the manual one more time.

I get calls all day long from people wanting to know how to reset the maintainence light or they call and tell you that the check engine light is on and they need to bring it in RIGHT NOW! ... drive 50 plus miles to the dealership all upset because it came on ... only to reset the MAINTAINENCE light that is actually on ... or tighten the gas cap that they are afraid to tighten because they will never get it off.

We had a guy call back today right after we did an oil change saying that he was pissed because we did not put oil back in it. I told him that I was sorry and we had the car towed in. When it got here we checked the oil and it was about 2 inches ABOVE the full mark. I asked him if he had done anything when he checked it and he said that he put 4 quarts in so it would come up to the line. Well ... he was not putting the dipstick in all the way. This was on a 1999 Civic and they had an issue with them where they would not go all the way in unless you really gave it a shove (there was a fix which was changing the o-rings on the stick). I showed him the dipstick and told him that now the engine had 8 quarts in it instead of the recommended 4 quarts. So we put the car on the lift and drained 4 quarts out and rechecked it. We handed the guy a bill for the tow and he got pissed. He said there was no way he was gonna pay it. We said that the vehickle would not leave until it was paid. I explained to him that if it was indeed something we did that he would not be charged for the tow. We told him that we would NOT pay for a tow of a vehicle because of someone's ignorance. If it was our fault ... we pay. If it is your fault ... you pay. This guys needs a lock on the hood.

We had another girl come in the other day with her car all wrecked. We told her she would need to take it to a body shop as we did not have one. We recommended a Ford dealership near us that does some nice work. She says ... "they do warranty work on Hondas there?". I ask her what warranty work she needed done. She says "My car of course ... to fix it from the wreck". I explain to her that warranty will not pay for that and she got right irate. She said that she did not understand why she paid all that money for the car that was supposed to be covered for 3 years and 36,000 miles and we would not cover this. I told her she would have to contact her insurance company about getting it fixed. She did not want to do that because then her rates would be raised. Ignorance ...pure ignorance.

I guess the bottom line here is that no matter what the product is ... be it a car or a saw or whatever ... if you are not smart enough to own one do NOT expect the manufacturer to take you by the hand and fix anything that goes wrong because of sheer ignorance. You really gotta wonder how some people can even come out in public by themselves.

Thanks for letting me rant.

[primarycolorinc]

With three rows of seats and three kids turning reading lights on after you have gotten out of the car, the battery has died on me numerous times. This car was made for people with kids, it should have an automatic timer to shut off the light that can drain a battery if not shut off. This problem has nothing to do with the intelligence or ignorance or "test score" of the car buyer. Your comments and examples have nothing to do with this problem. It portrays a small portion of the public that is relying on the dealer to spend a little time showing them the car and how it works after they just got finished spending (or borrowing) upwards of 30K dollars! If your dealer's customers are coming in with those problems, it's because the sales didn't spend enough time with the customer. Attitude is everything and your tirade shows an attitude that the customer is stupid. How sad.

I have gotten to the point where I have taped the shut off button to the "off" position to avoid dead batteries. Very inconvenient feature of this car.

[tsang750]

Whenever there are "customers" that are making comments, it is up to the auto manufacturer to take the comments, and work on it, no matter how "stupid" the comments look like. Now that if the auto maker take the comments and get the problem fixed, in this case, just throw in an auto-timer to shut off the lights, it will gained all these condidered to be "stupid" buyers to be happy, I would say "why not ?".

[Al_Bundy]

they don't make cars like they used to anymore...

[YellowViperGTS]

If I was the sole driver and user of my Odyssey, I am pretty sure that the lights would never be left on accidentally. But with three kids under the age of five things have changed! There should be a "master switch" that would allow the driver to bypass the default mode 15 minute cutoff switch if for some reason one wanted the interior lights to remain on.
While we using this thread for "rants" - I have brought the Odyssey in TWICE now for the problem we have with the passenger sliding door not closing properly, and both times been told there is no problem and absolutely nothing was done! Is anyone listening????

[rstein13]

I am not one to rant so I will keep this brief and objective in response to the tirade above.

Customers are stupid? How about dealers. Here is a list of stupid mistakes that I have personally experienced:

1- Lug nuts not tightened on wheel rotation.
2- Charged for R-12 recharge on an R-134 refrigerant system. When I informed the service writer I was TOLD that I was wrong. I lifted the hood and showed them the sticker (R-134 refrigerant). I was offered a free oil change and a refund the difference in price on the refrigerant (about $78.00).
3- Asked for radiator hoses to be changed and they changed the wrong hoses!!!
4- I asked for the EGR valve to be "checked" after a check engine light code yielded an EGR problem. They never checked it, just replaced it ($200.00). When the check engine light returned they discovered it was just a blocked hose. When I asked if they ever checked the EGR valve before replacing it all I got was a blank stare and then an accusation that I asked for it to be replaced.

There is more but I said I would be brief. After all I am just a stupid customer. What do I know?

Robert

[lorunner]

Originally Posted by rstein13

I am not one to rant so I will keep this brief and objective in response to the tirade above.

Customers are stupid? How about dealers. Here is a list of stupid mistakes that I have personally experienced:

1- Lug nuts not tightened on wheel rotation.
2- Charged for R-12 recharge on an R-134 refrigerant system. When I informed the service writer I was TOLD that I was wrong. I lifted the hood and showed them the sticker (R-134 refrigerant). I was offered a free oil change and a refund the difference in price on the refrigerant (about $78.00).
3- Asked for radiator hoses to be changed and they changed the wrong hoses!!!
4- I asked for the EGR valve to be "checked" after a check engine light code yielded an EGR problem. They never checked it, just replaced it ($200.00). When the check engine light returned they discovered it was just a blocked hose. When I asked if they ever checked the EGR valve before replacing it all I got was a blank stare and then an accusation that I asked for it to be replaced.

There is more but I said I would be brief. After all I am just a stupid customer. What do I know?

Robert

Charged for r12 is the parts departments fault not service. And if you paid for the egr valve and had less than 80k then you are stupid because its still under warrenty.

[gwsconsultant]

The 2003 has such a switch. But the damned thing is f####d-up. The battery still died with the swith left in the all lights off position. There has to be some kind of wiring screw-up that allows a slow current drain?
Two totally dead not chargable batteries in 45 days. next time Im invoking the lemon law and making them buy the car back!

[rstein13]

In response to lorunner:

I abbreviated the story about the R12 (remember I was trying to keep it short). What REALLY happened (since you brought it up) is that I left the dealer the day the service was performed. When I got home I realized the error. I called the dealer with my complaint. They called me back to say I was wrong. I carefully explained WHY I (the stupid customer) was right. The manager was on vacation. He called me back a week later and told me I (the stupid customer) was wrong. I asked him to check with Toyota. He called me back a day later to say that they had, in fact, charged the system with R-134 and just keyed in the wrong item in the computer. No explanation for why they had all insisted that I (the stupid customer) was wrong for almost two weeks and now I was suddenly right.
As fas as the EGR valve goes, you should ask before you insult. I maybe a stupid customer but even I know that the emissions warranty covers me for 100,000 miles in NY state. My vehicle had over 150,000 miles at the time of service. You might have suggested that, if I had less than 100,000 miles, that I request a refund. That would have been helpful. But then again, dealership employees are rarely helpful to stupid customers, right?

Best regards,
Robert

[lorunner]

Well i really didn't bring it up it to be honest with you it was you hwo came here and posted in defense of stupid customers and didn't post all f the info. Your just like everyother who expects people to know the whole story by only telling little portions of the story. This is the lif of a service employee by the way all people do is come in and give these breif explenations (mainly because they are hidding things) and then they expect us the dealer to make heads or tails of it. Well i hate to say it but the batteries in my crystal ball went dead a year ago and i never replaced ithem.

as far as the freon issue you make it sound like you never make mistakes. its not like they charged the car with r-12 they just billed it out wrong.

Again still no mention of the radiator hoses, I guess when have to draw our own conclusion with that,

And as far as the egr valve how does one just check it. What you should have said was that my check engine lite was on can you tell me the problem. Not check the egr valve. Everybody things that just because a code is pulled and it says egr or O2 sensor etc that thats what the problem is thhey don't realize that there is a fair bit of diagnosis that needs to be performed rather than just throwing in a part.

[rstein13]

lorunner- It is almost impossible to sit here and write in all of the details of every scenario but I will tell you that my cars are in top condition with all proper maintenance performed. When there is a problem I describe it to my dealer in detail and do my best not to omit any details. I DO make mistakes but I am NOT the car expert so I expect them to do their job and find out what is going on.
Just to fill in the gaps: I am still not sure what was put in my AC system. They say R-134 and they (as well as you) say it was an invoicing error. Fine. Why did they take two weeks and three conversations (with me insisting I knew what I was talking about) before they relented?
EGR Valve: I had been in the dealer on three occasions with the check engine light. THEY said it was an EGR code and said "if it comes on again you will need an EGR Valve". When it came on again I ordered the part (as a way to avoid another trip to the dealer). When I brought in the vehicle I specifically said " the check engine light is on. Please check it out and, if it turns out to be the egr valve, I have ordered it and it is on hand". The service writer wrote it down as " change egr valve" ( as per the service managers later admission). NO MENTION in the write up of diagnosis. Oh well.
As far as the radiator hoses (since I know you are curious), the vehicle has two sets of hoses (Toyota Previa has front and rear hoses due to mid-enigne design). I asked for the rear hoses and thermostat to be replaced. They replaced the front ones and the thermostat. It wasn't a big deal since the front ones ended up needing replacement anyway but they did not listen to me when they wrote up the order.
I do speak english as a first language and (no offense to anyone) I do not mumble or stutter.
By the way, I love my current dealer. They are the ones that messed up on the EGR valve but they made good on it. In six years of servicing that is the only time they screwed up. They are honest, and don't overcharge (and were quick to admit the mistake when it happened). So there are good dealers, service people and customers!!!

Regards,
Robert

[lorunner]

so let me get this straight you are replying to a honda post and you have a toyota previa? and you say the dealers are stupid. lol

[rstein13]

so let me get this straight. You believe that people only own one vehicle. And they say that customers are stupid!!!