buying a car off the truck is still no guarantee. Me and a buddy once had a temp job unloading cars from freighters. We raced everyone of em off the boat and into a gated area. Our supervisors wanted us to move as fast as possible short of having an accident. And once when we were loading up new corvettes we drove em as fast as we possibly could, Weeee

 

I got mine in February with 71 miles on the odometer. Who knows how they got there?
I do know it helped me get $1,000 below MSRP, and 3200 miles later the car's running smooth as silk. Honda made 'em tough.

 

That's what I said--"Even then, the car has to be driven onto and off of the truck, so who knows how it was driven when it was being put on the truck."

So, the only way to guarantee that the car isn't abused is to live in the car while it's being assembled (like the VW commercial). You would need to be with the car every waking moment once it rolls of the assembly line, during tests in Japan, during transit to the U.S., to the dealership, and all the way to your garage.

 

I've been wondering if Honda could set up a rev limiter that would stop you from overrevving the motor (5300 rpm)until the break in period is done? It seems like a doable thing that would save a lot of hassle.

 

That would be the perfect solution! It should be an easy change to the ECU software. They already have a rev limiter for engine/oil temperature, so why couldn't they add one for mileage?

 

From what I have heard from salesmen, Honda does not have demo cars, they just use the new cars for test drives. My friend who delivered a few s2000s, drove it quite fast from one dealer to another.

 

I reckon 5 or 6 miles can be accounted for by the delivery chain (plant->parking lot->lorry->ship->lorry->PDI center->lorry->dealer). Each arrow is a cold engine short drive and the VTEC cut-out should protect. From experience (showing off ) the cut-out works until the engine temp is up to normal, 3 bars.

In an ideal world you need to witness delivery off the lorry at the dealer and clock the mileage. Boys will be boys and salesmen will always get away with anything they can

Which is why I prefer to wait for my MY02 being built to order whereas I jumped at a deal in Oct'99 ( A bit like losing your virginity. Take what's offered in the dark and very grateful for it. I'm still grateful even after all these years of experience ).

Rog

 

Kind of on this subject, I am looking at getting my first S in about a year (just built a house and kind of put the S on back burner for a year) and was seriously considering buying a used S.

Would the majority sway against this? It seems that a lot of people are very concerned about the break-in period. Can that much damage be caused with improper break-in? The price difference between a new and used aren't that great, should I spring the extra 1 - 2k for a new one to have a great chance it wasn't abused? Thoughts?

Merg

 

Sheesh, what a thread. I don't even know if my wife was 'test driven' before I hooked up with her, but I have gotten forty years of good service with no serious breakdowns, and I certainly won't worry about it.

To be serious, my son worked part time for an American car dealership while he was in college, and his horror stories about the way the employees treated brand new cars were absolutely blood curdling.

 

Are you really freakin' serious?? 15 miles and you are this concerned.