More Maintenance on the Civic

by Flexo on September 19, 2005

in Uncategorized

My 2004 Honda Civic LX is still a wonderful car. I passed 30,000 miles last month and, as I want to keep current with maintenance, I took the car in for tire rotation, an oil change, a new air filter, and a brake inspection.

Last time, I took my car to the dealer and spent about $230. This time, fueled by the helpful comments submitted I took the car to Pep Boys instead. Put simply, I got much more from Pep Boys at $60 than I got from Honda at $230.

The oil change was $24.49 but I have a $7 rebate coming to me. That seems about average. Tire rotation was $10 and the new air filter was $14. The two wiper blades were about $16 total. It seems I made the correct choice this time.



About the Author

Flexo, the owner and creator of Consumerism Commentary, has been blogging and writing for the internet since 1995 and has been building online communities since 1991. Find out more about him and follow him on Twitter.

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{ 6 comments }

1 Financial Fruition September 19, 2005 at 7:42 pm

A couple of things:

Sears has free tire rotations (F to B, B to F). Period, no other strings attached.

Wipers, I always elect to purchase and install myself.

The heck with replaceable air filters. I bought a K&N the first I had to change it in my vehicle (54,000 miles ago) and no replacement needed!

I definitely agree that PepBoys is cheaper than your dealer! Especially with Hondas!

2 ncnblog September 19, 2005 at 7:46 pm

Hey, good job on finding a better deal. Quick note on the honda…if it is like mine, my honda air filter takes about 10 seconds to change, at a cost of less than 6 to 10 bucks. You just unsnap two little latches, take the old one out, put the new one in.
love the blog!
ncnblog.com

3 Caitlin September 20, 2005 at 6:41 pm

ditto on the K&N filter … one time reasonable cost ($50-60) and then it lasts for a very long time before you have to clean and re-oil it

gives your car a horsepower boost too (a small one) and because it’s not disposable, it’s keeping stuff out of landfills.

Consider it for next time :)

4 Flexo September 20, 2005 at 8:15 pm

Absolutely. Thanks for the tips.

5 Cap September 21, 2005 at 7:22 pm

oh wow 30K on a 2004. You drive a lot huh?

My 01 has er.. 50K on it. It also has a K&N filter (you’ll need to clean it occasionally though with their $10 cleaning kit).

Although pepboy is cheaper, you should consider finding a trusthworthy local auto shop. I know its difficult to find, but down the road they may be worth it.

Pepboy can handle the minor stuff like oil change etc. fine, even wal-mart can do that okay.. but if you ever need any medium to major repair work.. establishing a relationship with a good local mecahnic is helpful.

I’ll recommend going to AAA.com, punch in ur zip code and try to find AAA approved auto repair shops.

I filtered out my results more, but picking the ones that have consistently received customer satsifaction awards from AAA.

6 Flexo September 21, 2005 at 7:40 pm

My commute is something like 50 miles each way. This might change soon, however…

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