Thank You, I see but have to research it. Every thing I have read said 0w20 was synthetic. Then I seen ConocoPhillips having a synthetic blend.

It discounted so it might be a GF4 rating oil, either way its a good deal.

 

It's possible that I'm mistaken...the only reason I researched it is because at my last oil change I requested full synthetic and paid for it...an hour later my service advisor called me and explained that I wasn't given synthetic and instead was given conventional and they would comp my next oil change with the full synthetic. I was worried because I was under the impression that 0W-20 was synthetic only and that they had given me the wrong weight oil so I immediately hopped online and I did find a place that sold single quart bottles of the conventional, syn-blend, and of course the full synthetic...all Honda genuine labeled...

 

I am seeing that its still a secret on weather its synthetic or conventional. But I found this. Genuine Fluids

You have to scroll down but all the car mfg oils are listed.


They probably put in 5w20 which is OK too. No harm done except make them change to the right oil. They did it to my Fit too.

 

I decided to get new tires at 5/32 of tread and at that point I had put on 28000 miles on the stock Dunlops. I would have waited a little bit longer, but it seems like winter season is right here and I had some time. After pouring through test results, I decided on the Yokohama Avid ENVigor:

Yokohama AVID ENVigor (H&V)

My belief is that a tire should last for at least 50,000 miles and the stock Dunlops simply did not come through. The Yokohamas have a tire wear rating of 560 where as the stock Dunlops are 320 so the Yokos should last about 50,000 miles. The Yokos had very favorable ratings both in the instrumented testing done by Tire Rack and the customer reviews.

In driving around on the Yokos, the ride is somewhat softer and more refined. There is less noise then with the Dunlops, but it is not whisper quiet. Going over potholes is a more manageable experience. Steering seems to be a bit duller, but that is not a bad thing. I have almost gotten into a few accidents because the steering on the Honda Fit with the Dunlops was simply too sharp. I like having a little play in the wheel because sometimes you have to do things in the car like look down at a cell phone or adjust the radio. I found that with the Dunlops even the slightest turns of the wheel would change the direction of the car. The Yokos seem to make this less so.

I also just replaced both the brake pads and rotors (for a second time). This time, I used Autozone's ceramic gold cmax pads and NAPA's ultra premium rotors. I just wasnt having luck with the Honda OEM brake pads. I found it unacceptable the pads were wearing away at 15,000 miles. Autozone and NAPA do have some excellent quality pads and rotors so lets see if this works. So far the new pads and rotors are very quiet and I cant really tell the difference between them and the stock pads.

 

Did you have it aligned? If so did they report on how bad it was before adjustment?

 

I speak from the experience of owning several cars in my life as well as being an automobile professional.

You should only have the car aligned if its obviously pulling to one side, there is repaired structural damage to the car, the wheel has been hit/damaged or a suspension component has been replaced.

In my experience, tie rod ends usually last about 50,000 miles before they start to come loose. Usually when tires are replaced, they replace the tie rod ends and then the car needs to be aligned. At 28000 miles, I did not feel the car needed to be aligned. I will wait until these tires wear out and then at that point I will need to get the tie rod ends replaced and car aligned.

 

I think you missed the uneven tire wear part.... so you mean you sell cars, right? Just wondering.

 

Right now, I adjust insurance damage estimates for cars involved in accidents. I have worked in bodyshops and at car dealerships before basically selling repairs and earning a commission on it. As long as the car doesnt pull I dont think you will have to worry about uneven tread.

You only will need to do an alignment every 50,000 unless the car is pulling. When they do an alignment, they will probably find the tie rod ends are bad.

 

I have had cars that would wear out one or both front tires either on one side or the other,but they didn't pull or shimmy.. Everything felt fine but wasn't... Not pulling to one or the other side while an alignment was needed was due to the cars being equipped with power steering... More recently I have noticed that using wheels with low offset measurements on cars that have been lowered will show cupping at times as well as wear on the inside tread of the front tread.. That I have had occur on my Fit.. I couldn't feel it pulling to either side but when driving on a rainy day the the front of the car was likely to head off in any direction if it was capable to get up to any speed over 45 MPH, at which speed still was scary under this condition... The weirdest thing is that my steering wheel wasn't centering when I drove in a straight line but after putting a rear tower bar and the one like a clothes hanger rack, the wheel was only slightly off to the left.. Installing wheels with a 45mm offset and 6 1/2" width instead of the ones with 38mm offset or 41mm offset both with 7" width rims and the steering wheel is maybe 1/8" 1/4" off at most where the spoke meets the wheel... Generally when a car will pull more to one side than another, it low tire that needs air causing the problem but if that doesn't fix the problem it can be a suspension problem caused by an overweight driver or passenger or just a sagging spring.... I wish I could get even 25000 miles out of a set of tires with a 50000 mile warranty but it just ain't going to happen.. I am getting my alignment done since I recently bought new tires and hope that I can get better wear than I normally do... I don't drive as fast as I used to and I am driving more slowly as I get older... Maybe I can verify SevereService's post about 50000 mile alignment.. I have been 40000 miles in the car without an alignment and I know that I will move the tires front to back and have an alignment done after I install the front coil overs probably in a few days if I am up to it.... The problem with most of the cars that have alignment problem thing going on all of the time is due to aftermarket springs with extreme drops and minimal offset wheels with overly wide rims... The look is hard on suspensions and steering components and makes your car drive funny because it overloads the front and rear axles and all the is associated with them.. Keep cash stashed away and find a front end man that you like because you will be seeing a lot of him if you have the hella flush thing going on, or you can keep shelling out cash for new tires.

 

I had a Toyota Solara SLE once with 17 inch aftermarket rims which always seemed out of alignment. Then I had a company car, 2005 Chevrolet Impala with steel wheels, which never seemed to need an alignment. I put 60,000 miles on it before they took it away and got me another and there was never any uneven tire wear.

I kind of think it depends on the car...

 

I've just replaced the OEM dun's like you have, but went with the DWS. After I put the them on I took it for an alignment, something I always do when spending the $$'s on a set of tires.

Turns out it was tracking left. The shop did their voodoo and all is well.

Thing about car alignments is that as the tires wear they wear into the pattern dictated by the cars set-up. You might not see uneven wear, but I'll assure you it's there. Timely tire rotations tend to even out this wear distributing it around all tires, thus extending the life of the tires, but making the wear patterns harder to see.

If I had taken my car in for an alignment check before I put the new set on the alignment results would have been different. The wear on a set of tires does effect the alignment process.

You are correct, it entirely depends on the car and the wheels and the tire itself. Plus, as Coyote points out, any suspension mods done. Anything that effects the running geometry effects alignment.

Also road shock puts untold stress on suspension and steering parts.

On our Fits it states to have the brakes off, steering wheel dead centered, a passenger in the drivers seat and a full tank of fuel when having an alignment.

Tire wear is a very good indication of alignment issues. Any racer will tell you this, it carries over to on street driving as well, trust me on that.

K_C_

 

dealerships..

 

Besides uneven tire pressures,sizes,and or designs, caster and camber changes on either side could cause it to pull, while toe in or out probably will not,it will though, cause wear on the either side of the tires.I have not looked into it closely ,but suspect caster and camber are pre set on the FIT.It will change most likely if you hit a good size pothole and bend something. JJ

 

I wanted to add that none of the places I ever worked at ever performed a "proper alignment". You do have to have a person in the drivers seat and a full tank of gas...a few other things you have to do too. However, no where I worked was any of that ever done. They simply did the alignment in the fastest manner possible with the "get it in and get it out" mentality.

Anytime I have had an alignment then usually I find myself taking it back to get it re-aligned. Most usually the wheel is off center on the cars Ive had in the past which were supposedly aligned properly.

 

I am right now at 32000 miles and its getting to be that time for another service. My first A1 service was $70, the second oil change was a B service along with brakes changed which cost nearly $350 and then my last oil change/tire rotation cost $50 and I provided the oil.

I changed out my brakes for a second time around 28,000 miles using the best pads Autozone had to offer along with Napa Ultra Premium rotors. I had to change to something different because I couldnt keep changing my brake pads every 14000 miles. I wanted to see if the Autozone pads would last longer. So far, I havent felt any difference between the Honda OEM pads and the Autozone pads during street driving. If we used instrumented testing than we might see a difference.

I am getting smarter and started checking the dealership websites. On one website, I found an oil change coupon for $26 and on another for $35. So if you look at the websites than you can get a pretty good deal using the coupons. However, buyer beware, auto dealerships will bait you in with that coupon and than they will try to switch you to another service. If you use those coupons, than make sure you tell the service guy exactly what you want and get it in writing before work is started.

At this point, the car has held up fairly well. Its already been in a few scrapes. A week ago I came out to find that a tow truck scraped up the side. The bodyshop I was parked at was more than willing to fix it. They rented me a car and it was Hyundai. All of the cars I have rented so far have been horrible and each time I couldnt wait to get back into my Fit. This Hyundai was horrible.

The complaints I have had with the Fit are the following:

- Honda Service dealerships are sharks. You can't go by their service menu otherwise you will be paying $150-200 for what is supposed to be just an oil change. Get the coupon off the site, tell them you just want an oil change and whatever other service is required get done somewhere else or do it yourself like air filter change. If the car has less than 75000 miles or less than 3 years old, you can probably do without the big service checkover. If a car has higher mileage or is older than sure, spend a little bit of money to have it checked over thoroughly by the professionals.

- Items like brakes, tires, etc. seem to wear away too quickly. The OEM brakes on my car last about 14000 miles, the original Dunlops lasted 30,000 miles. I would like to see those items last at least double that time.

- The fan speed control knob went out (only worked on high setting) and was replaced under warranty. Looking on the internet, it seems like this is a known problem which was found in the 2009 and 2010 model. They should have fixed that problem by now. It might be fixed in future models. Just something to think about.


I am going to take the car back to the window tint shop I use for the third time. I got 15% on the rear and back window, but you can still see through it. I am going to get 5% on the rear and quarter windows leaving the sides as is.

The Fit has a lot of visibility in all directions which can be a good thing, but its also a bad thing because anyone can see through the windows to see what you are doing. The 15% offers a decent amount of privacy, but I am going to take it one step further by darkening up the rear window quite a bit.

 

Well ,almost all Dealer Service Centers are sharks ,not just Honda.That is how they make a living,they have to sell sell sell,or they start letting people go.Now, I am not in any way related to dealerships ,service centers or anything like that, it is just the way things are,,everywhere.Brake Pads and tires longevity is a tradeoff, generally speaking a tire with a high treadwear number probably will last a bit longer but will not give you the performance you expect ,it's all in how hard or soft the compound is.Same goes with brake pads ,,long lasting brake pads will not necessarily have the best stopping power.
For me ,performance is paramount, even if I have to replace brake pads,tires,rotors, often than normal.IMHO,,stay safe, JJ

 

Thats right. When it comes to tires and brakes, durability and performance have an inverse relationship.

I find that Toyota cars are all about durability. I have had two Toyotas in my lifetime and never replaced the brake pads. The brake pads on Toyota Camries usually go for over 75000 miles. The ride on Toyotas is also somewhat mushy because the tires are also selected for durability. Everything on a Toyota is selected for all out durability so it rides more like an appliance than a car.

I noticed that turning isnt as crisp with the new tires and the ride in general is not as firm. I didnt mind because I use the vehicle for work and find myself in traffic all the time. I enjoy a little softer ride. As for the brakes, we could probably see the difference in instrumented testing, but I didnt notice any difference between the Autozone & Honda pads. These pads are ceramic, but thats about all that I know. We'll see if they indeed last longer.

 

You're seeming to burn through brakes. I'm over 30K miles and my OEM's are looking good.

 

I have 42000 miles on my car and have only had to replace windshield wipers and tires... I tend to have a problem with front tires wearing out even though the alignment isn't off and I rotate them frequently... It may be due to using the gas pedal more than the brake pedal..

 

According to my Garmin GPS system which is constantly on, I am stopped 25% of the time and my total average mph is 30. I live in the NJ/NYC area.

In any event, the Toyotas, Chevies and Fords which I drove in the same way in the past did not burn through the brakes in 15000 miles. The Toyotas especially seemed to keep going for a while.