Originally Posted By: wolfc70
Originally Posted By: SteveSRT8
Originally Posted By: Chris B.
my 2012 V6 Accord burns little to no oil in 5,000 mile oil changes. Runs better then any of the 20 or so cars I have owned in my life. GM makes nothing that can compare to Hondas quality. Lots of these engines running around with hundreds of thousands of miles and no problems.
We own a fleet of 3500 Vans and Silverados and have yet to get so much as a hiccup out of the AFM motors.
Note our last van sold had one half a MILLION miles on it, seems comparable to anyone IMO. Maybe not the GM Haters club...
The iron block AFM engines seem to have no issues. The aluminum blocks seem to have the oil consumption issues. Which is too bad, as these motors seem otherwise relatively long lived. My 2009 Silverado work truck uses a quart every 3500 miles or so. It has 44k on it. It did not touch a drop of oil until 30k miles. I get the oil changed at the dealer every 5-6k miles. I still have not figured out why some get iron blocks and some get aluminum. Both have the same HP and torque ratings.
The 4.8 and 6.0 in the GM vans seem to be very durable. I know a lot of delivery guys that have 250k plus on them.
As for the Honda VCM, well time will tell how they hold up. I don't like how they use only one bank during cylinder shut down. You are putting an awful lot of heat on one side of the engine. GM and the Hemi use both banks during shutdown. I think this spreads the heat load of the harder working cylinders over more. Less likely to get hot spots, etc.
+1. Mine is an 09 aluminum block 5.3. Started consuming between 25-30K. Recently just went through 2 quarts in 2300 miles. Dealer is doing the TSB as we speak. I've seen high consumption moters still humming along at 150k.
As for the Honda 3.5 VCM, there trends to be more varnish and buildup on the rear bank since it's isolated from air circulation underhood coupled with the exhaust manifold merging into one right below it. The rear bank just plain runs hotter. Fairly typical of all traverse mounted V6/8 engines. Some consume, some don't, but regardless if you keep the OCIs under 5k you can minimize the buildup. My local dealer says they see the most problems with 3.5s that have gone strictly by the MaIntenance Minder or longer, as it tends to be a little too liberal with OCIs in this particular application.
