2001 Honda Accord 4 cyl

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I bought a 01 Honda from my neighbor with 167k miles on it. The lady that owned it is 68 and bought it new. I asked her what she used and of course told me she took to the Honda dealer for every oil change about 3 changes a year or every 4k miles. Its in real good shape for the age of the car with just some paint fade and the best part she only wanted 950.00 dollars for it. I was going to use some high mileage oil like valvoline 5w20 semi syn hm but looking on the net Ive seen some people have used 10w30 ,5w30 and 5w20? in the car. What would be best for it?
 
These F23 engines really aren't picky about oil. Run whatever 5W20 is on sale. The transmissions on these cars are failure-prone so look out.
 
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Run 5w30 valvoline maxlife or quaker state defy. Arizona is plenty hot so it dont see it being a problem. Run a good fuel system cleaner like redline si1,gumout regane or techron fuel system cleaner and enjoy your car. Wash and wax as best you can. Check your tranny fluid and inquire about a drain and fill if its due;no flushing it ever. Congrads on getting a Honda.
 
Your F23 is just like the F22 in my old accord - it's not to picky.
Personally I'd run any 5w30 or 10w30 .

On a side note :
Have you checked for recalls on it ?
It may be involved in the Takata airbag fiasco.
 
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I'd probably go with Valvoline MaxLife 5w30 and replace the pcv valve with an oem version. Very easy to do. Originally the F23 was spec'd 5w30 but that changed some time after 1999.

A drain and fill would be a good idea. Who knows if the dealer ever did it. I'd probably consider changing the t-stat with an oem unit since they can stick around the 10 yr mark. Those will be the major things.
 
These are good cars and the engines are truly bulletproof as long as the timing belt is changed every hundred K or so.
Is this an auto or a stick? The automatics are known to be troublesome.
We had a '99 5 spd 4dr that we bought new in August of that year for $16.8K.
A great and trouble free car for the 175K and thirteen years that we had it.
We have a beater '02 that one of our sons is using. The autobox has been dying for the past 30K but we've had enough use out of it that if it gets hauled off tomorrow, I've gotten more than my money out of it.
Oil?
In your climate, a 10W-30 would be fine as would a 5W-30.
Don't even bother with a 5W-20. No advantage in it and Honda only recommended this grade sometime after the first model of this generation of Accord appeared in 1998.
Our '99 had 5W-30 recommended for it while the '02 has 5W-20 recommended, so I use 5W-30 in it.
 
For standard OCI's, use the cheapest oil on sale. Kmart has Smitty's for only $2/qt, a little more for HM. I believe Honda's factory-recommended OCI is 7500 miles.

Pair it with a Wix/Napa Gold, or the cheaper counterparts (Napa Silver/Proselect, Pro-Tec, Walmart ST, Microgard, etc). Hastings/Baldwin is also good.

Napa Platinum is on sale this month for $7.50, which makes it cheaper than the Gold for your application.

Originally Posted By: mclasser
These F23 engines really aren't picky about oil. Run whatever 5W20 is on sale. The transmissions on these cars are failure-prone so look out.


Only the V6 has that transmission failure.
 
Not true.
The automatic transaxle of the four cylinder cars of this generation is also prone to failure at an early age.
This is well known and I have personal experience with it.
The stick is the way to go in these cars, just as it was when they were new.
 
Originally Posted By: slacktide_bitog
Only the V6 has that transmission failure.

Tell that to my 4-banger whose tranny grenaded.
 
Any name brand xW30 should be able to be used in Phoenix all year. Most Honda 4-cyl engines are easy on oil, exceptions are F20C and F22C in S2000. It needs shear stable 10W30 or thicker xW40 oil, mainly because higher rev on highway speed.
 
If not for the price I would never ever buy a Honda again after the [censored] I went through with a 01 Civic EX auto....trans went out...engine went out...everything failed on the car before 75k. Got in a legal battle with American Honda and got a little back.....but at 950 i cant loose IMHO......Im sure I could flip it for 2k and pocket a grand.
 
I'm pretty sure you'd have little trouble getting 2K for it.
WRT your '01 Civic, we've had three Civics, four Accords and an Ody and have never seen that kind of trouble with any of them.
Even the '02 with the dying tranny has held together long enough for me to have gotten out the money I spent for it.
 
If it's not consuming or leaking oil, I would run 5W-30 HM, such as Valvoline maxlife, Castrol GTX, QS Defy. I have two Accord's, one with 240K is burning oil 1 quart/750 miles . The engine can take any oil HDEO 15w-40, PCMO up to 20W-50. Now it's got ST HM 10W 40 with Napa silver filter.
 
I'd run 5w30 in it. I own a 1999 Accord with the 2.3 and I can tell you first hand that it's a pretty durable engine. I have 288,000 miles on mine, it's not my daily commuter anymore but I bet it could still handle another 100,000 miles easy.

I put every different type of weight in it...every different brand (sometimes all at the same time), I even put a mixture of mystery oil and diesel oil in it once because I had run out of 5w30...just topped it off with whatever I could find. I spent one summer putting 0w20 full synthetic into it - didn't seem to like that very much - as I was adding a quart every other week.

As others have said, it's the transmissions that go bad on these cars, although I never had a problem with mine. Another thing to look out for is rotted front cradles, it's a design flaw, Honda placed the evaporator tube right inside of the cradle, rotting them out. Most are junk after 10 years, you should definitely take a good look because they rot out right where the lower control arm brackets are welded to the cradle...big problem. And an even bigger repair.
 
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