VTEC reliability...

On an old Top gear that was on the other night, Jeremy Clarkson was saying
that Honda's variable timing kit is so reliable that they have *never* had a
failure ascribed to it.

Any truth in that rumour?

Obviously TG is always to be believed 100% and only ever factual, so I'm
tempted to think they're right. But it seems unlikely...

"PC Paul" <urd (AT) bitrot (DOT) co.uk> wrote

On an old Top gear that was on the other night, Jeremy Clarkson was saying
that Honda's variable timing kit is so reliable that they have *never* had
a
failure ascribed to it.

Any truth in that rumour?

Obviously TG is always to be believed 100% and only ever factual, so I'm
tempted to think they're right. But it seems unlikely...

From what I know of the mechanism if it fails all it does is not engage warp
factor 9 at full throttle, the pins that lock into the second cam profile
followers do not move far enough to fall out they are either engaged or
sitting facing the inside edges of the second cam follower.

OTOH all the normal modes of failure can occur: over-revving (somethings
gotta give :-) ), broken conrods (due to over-revving), pistons holed
(usually only due to fuelling or turbo induced faults), broken cambelt etc.

Chris

On 13 Apr, 21:00, "PC Paul" <u... (AT) bitrot (DOT) co.uk> wrote:

On an old Top gear that was on the other night, Jeremy Clarkson was saying
that Honda's variable timing kit is so reliable that they have *never* had a
failure ascribed to it.

Any truth in that rumour?

Obviously TG is always to be believed 100% and only ever factual, so I'm
tempted to think they're right. But it seems unlikely...

I was behind an Integra VTEC type R just yesterday and it was blue-
smoking quite badly when he floored it. I could smell it too. So maybe
that will be the first one.
I think I heard of a VFR800 vtec (bike..does that count?) that let go.
And they need a big £500 service every 15000miles.

Al

PC Paul (urd (AT) bitrot (DOT) co.uk) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were
saying :

On an old Top gear that was on the other night, Jeremy Clarkson was
saying that Honda's variable timing kit is so reliable that they have
*never* had a failure ascribed to it.

Any truth in that rumour?

Back when the first (L-reg?) Civic VTis were in the UK, there were a couple
as CoCars where I was working at the time.

One had had a stone-holed rad and been a little bit overheated. Thereafter,
it spent roughly 50% of it's time in dock.

Whether that counts as a failure "ascribed" to the VVT, gawd knows - but it
was one of the things that gave all sorts of shit. Quite why Honda didn't
just lob a new lump in it, gawd knows.

"PC Paul" <urd (AT) bitrot (DOT) co.uk> wrote

On an old Top gear that was on the other night, Jeremy Clarkson was saying
that Honda's variable timing kit is so reliable that they have *never* had
a failure ascribed to it.

Any truth in that rumour?

Obviously TG is always to be believed 100% and only ever factual, so I'm
tempted to think they're right. But it seems unlikely...

IIRC this is a reference to the actual mechanism that engages the hot cam,
and that mechanism has never failed. IIRC it's a pin operated by oil
pressure, so it's hardly likely to fail...

"PC Paul" <urd (AT) bitrot (DOT) co.uk> wrote

On an old Top gear that was on the other night, Jeremy Clarkson was saying
that Honda's variable timing kit is so reliable that they have *never* had
a failure ascribed to it.

Any truth in that rumour?

Yes, as I understand. As others have said it's essentially a pin and oil
pressure. Low oil pressure, the pin doesn't engage and the VTEC doesn't use
the higher lift profile.

Obviously TG is always to be believed 100% and only ever factual, so I'm
tempted to think they're right. But it seems unlikely...

It does, doesn't it? Plenty of other bits may go wrong on a Honda... but
not the VTEC gubbins.

--
The DervMan
www.dervman.com

In article <jjRTh.1241$Ro3.1230 (AT) text (DOT) news.blueyonder.co.uk>,
PC Paul <urd (AT) bitrot (DOT) co.uk> wrote:

On an old Top gear that was on the other night, Jeremy Clarkson was
saying that Honda's variable timing kit is so reliable that they have
*never* had a failure ascribed to it.

Any truth in that rumour?

Obviously TG is always to be believed 100% and only ever factual, so I'm
tempted to think they're right. But it seems unlikely...

Honda claim all sorts of things about the reliability of their engines.
Even some in the trade believe them. They may well be more reliable than
the average, but 'no failures' would be stretching a point. Unless they're
rather more honest than others.

--
*Why is the third hand on the watch called a second hand?

Dave Plowman dave (AT) davenoise (DOT) co.uk London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On 2007-04-13, Adrian <toomany2cvs (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote:

PC Paul (urd (AT) bitrot (DOT) co.uk) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were
saying :

On an old Top gear that was on the other night, Jeremy Clarkson was
saying that Honda's variable timing kit is so reliable that they have
*never* had a failure ascribed to it.

Any truth in that rumour?

Back when the first (L-reg?) Civic VTis were in the UK, there were a couple
as CoCars where I was working at the time.

One had had a stone-holed rad and been a little bit overheated. Thereafter,
it spent roughly 50% of it's time in dock.

Whether that counts as a failure "ascribed" to the VVT, gawd knows - but it
was one of the things that gave all sorts of shit. Quite why Honda didn't
just lob a new lump in it, gawd knows.

I'd reckon a problem caused by overheating due to a hole in the radiator
is rather unlikely to be ascribed to VVT, don't you?

--
David Taylor

In message <jjRTh.1241$Ro3.1230 (AT) text (DOT) news.blueyonder.co.uk>, PC Paul
<urd (AT) bitrot (DOT) co.uk> writes

On an old Top gear that was on the other night, Jeremy Clarkson was saying
that Honda's variable timing kit is so reliable that they have *never* had a
failure ascribed to it.

As I remember the claim, it's specifically failure of the VTEC hardware,
and it's more along the lines of never having had one fail under
warranty.

--
Steve Walker

David Taylor (davidt-news (AT) yadt (DOT) co.uk) gurgled happily, sounding much
like they were saying :

On an old Top gear that was on the other night, Jeremy Clarkson was
saying that Honda's variable timing kit is so reliable that they
have *never* had a failure ascribed to it.

Any truth in that rumour?

Back when the first (L-reg?) Civic VTis were in the UK, there were a
couple as CoCars where I was working at the time.

One had had a stone-holed rad and been a little bit overheated.
Thereafter, it spent roughly 50% of it's time in dock.

Whether that counts as a failure "ascribed" to the VVT, gawd knows -
but it was one of the things that gave all sorts of shit. Quite why
Honda didn't just lob a new lump in it, gawd knows.

I'd reckon a problem caused by overheating due to a hole in the
radiator is rather unlikely to be ascribed to VVT, don't you?

I'd reckon that an engine that can be so utterly fucked by _only_ a stone-
damaged rad is not to be held up as a paragon of reliability.