Our Jazz is in for its service in a few days and one of the things they mentioned when we booked it in was an engine flush.

The car is on a 59 plate and has only done 40K miles.

A bit of reading on the internet reveals all kinds of stories, mostly negative, but pertaining to older engines.

So is this the main dealers' latest wheeze to extract money from punters or is it a good thing to have done ?

 

I would take that to mean a coolant change rather than some kind of special thin flushing oil to "clean" the internals - which you are correct in thinking is generally not a good thing to do.

 

When I asked what it was for they said it was to help emissions so I'm assuming it is some kind of engine oil chemical flush.

 

In that case, I'd be inclined to say "no thank you" - as long as it's been serviced every year you shouldn't have and kind of sludge build up. I do tend to run a full fuel tank of Redline SI-1 fuel system cleaner before a service but make sure I've used that tank fully before it goes in to not break down the new oil in any way.

 

Yes, sounds like Homeopathy to me.

If it's cruddy in there, halve the oil change intervals. But that's usually worn FRM-bore engines that get a lot of VTEC.

Problem seems to be that flushing oil loosens up crud & it can jam up VTEC gauze filters, etc and cause tope-end issues.

Thus, never flush a Honda engine.

 

The car is used mainly around town and for commuting so gets very little vtec action.

I had advised the missus that I thought it was a bad idea, but that backs it up.

Thanks.

 

Get them to check the gearbox bearings whilst it's in - TSB for them and it's a common fail point.

 

Didn't know about that so will ask them to have a look especially as it's still under warranty.

 

01 to 08 by the looks of it - yours may be outside the affected batch but it's always worth running the VIN just to be sure.