Throttle Position Sensor went out...OUCH!

2002 CR-V
78233 miles
California

Throttle position sensor went out so the whole throttle body needed
replacement. They can't replace just the sensor.
Total cost: $1000.00.

American Honda just called and are going to "review" for possible
"goodwill" coverage. The representative didn't sound to encouraging.

I have the TSB 04-008 which admits to a defective part.
http://www.in.honda.com/Rjanisis/pubs/SB/A04-008.PDF

This is so frustrating.
I have owned, and my family has owned, Honda for decades. 2 of our 3
vehicles are Honda.

This thousand dollar bill is souring me to Honda big time.
It would be a shame for Honda to lose me over this.

Any advice here?


---

 

Makes one want to take a closer look at a Hyundai. IIRC they have a
10-year, 100K miles warranty. And they don't cost as much as a Honda.

Bearman Owner, over the years, of six Hondas

 

It certainly does.
10 year 100k is an awesome incentive.

---

 

Before all the hoopla you should look at what that 100k warranty covers....

 

Who is hoopla-ing? I'm just pointing out that there are alternatives. Of
course you should look at the warranty, especially if that's the reason
you're looking at Hyundais.

 

1. don't pay attention to trolls.
2. shop around. the part costs $571 from hondaautomotiveparts.com. you
could replace it yourself.
3. shop around some more. afaict, honda use a limited number of tps
designs, and it's easy enough to get another one from a junk yard.

if you find one and fit it, be aware that the reason honda say to
replace the whole thing is sensor calibration. but that shouldn't be
too hard to do yourself. here's how to do it: take a small [fresh]
battery, say 1.5v or 3v, and connect it so the battery is between the
two outer connectors on the tps output - they connect to the resistor
track. then measure precisely the voltage between the middle one
relative to both the outers. the sum of the two should be exactly the
battery voltage when connected. it should be roughly 0.15v relative to
zero if the battery is 1.5v. again, measure this precisely with a dvm.
now, after fitting the "new" [or repaired, which is also possible in
my experience] sensor, position the sensor so that it now replicates the
exact same voltages with the throttle in the same position.

now you have a calibrated tps and you can drive again! usually, the
sensors fail at a point on the track where the throttle most commonly
sits when driving, but it's ok at the idle position so you can do this
measure/calibrate procedure.

oh, and honda usually use shear head bolts to hold the tps on. those
will unscrew if you carefully use a chisel, or even a reverse helix drill.

 

jim beam4/8/08 23:

Jim

I understood most of what you said about calibrating the TP sensor but got
just a little fuzzy on this sentence.

Did you mean 0.15 volts? Or was it a typo? If you could explain it again it
would be very helpful. This is potentially a real money saver for people
with this problem on an out of warranty repair. I understood the rest of it.
I have used reverse bits to remove studs and shear bolts before and it works
pretty well if you drill a small diameter pilot hole in the exact center of
the broken stud or bolt. Have even done very small bolts like the ones that
hold on the distributor cap. It was a lot cheaper than buying a new
distributor but it requires a steady hand and the patience of Job.

Where did you learn how to do this? I can't believe Honda put it in a
service manual.
--
Pickleman

Please remove "yourpants" to reply
1998 Civic HX MT with 142K
2000 CRV EX MT with 98K

 

Things break. Buy an extended service agreement next time from Honda if you
don't like the roll of the dice.

 

One expensive repair in 8 years and 80K miles and you're ready to give
up on Honda?

 

The fact is that in the TSB, Honda admits to a "defect in manufacturing".
I am perfectly willing to accept legitimate expenses but when the part
in question is a known defect then why should the consumer be held liable?
Hummm???

 

If they ALL were defective, then my guess is it would have been a recall and
not a TSB. If yours was one of the defective ones, it probably wouldn't
have lasted as long as it did.

Just speculating here mind you...

 

no, zero point one five. or approx 1/10th of the total voltage.

just like a potentiometer used in electronics, the throttle position
sensor is a resistor laid in a circular track, and a centrally mounted
brush contacts the track at a position that you can set, in this case by
moving the throttle. on my 89 civic, 5V is applied across the resistor
and the contact can therefore tap in at any point in between - half way
being 2.500V, 1/3 being 1.667V, etc. if you measure the voltage on the
contact on the old tps, then replicate it with the new tps, without
adjusting anything else on the throttle body, it should be calibrated as
before.

i suggest using a low voltage power source doing this with the throttle
body off the car because higher voltage than factory might burn the
resistor. and you're after the differential, not an absolute value.

or it's fun to do if you're a geek with the tools and inclination.

well, i got the idea from the service manual. the tps fault finding
page has a graph of voltages and throttle position, and it shows idle as
"0.5V", and 5V is the system voltage, so 10% is the place to start
looking, with actual number being the result of calibration. everything
else in the replacement process just depends on how many toys you have!
you can fudge a repair on the tps itself as well, but my advice is
replace it if you can find a suitable donor since actual repair is a pita.

 

I had to replace fuel injectors and a clutch slave cylinder in Acuras
and an idle air control valve in a Toyota; all of these were covered
under various TSBs. Yeah, the manufacturers sometimes get it wrong. Of
course, none of these parts failed within the warranty period. Just
like your TPS. Unlike your situation, I didn't get the Acura repair
work done at a dealership (after asking about manufacturer support for
the work, of course) so my repair cost was lower. The Toyota repair
was partially covered by Toyota but the part had relatively few miles
on it.

Re. Honda support: try to speak directly with the district or regional
manager. They've got lots of latitude. That's how I got Toyota
support.

 

jim beam wrote:

-------------------

I wonder what a wrecking yard would charge for a throttle body ? Maybe
$200 - $250 ?

Takes about 8 minutes to remove it yourself, especially off a wreck....
Of course you'd want to replace the gaskets with OEM, but it wouldn't
even need to be calibrated, just do the 'idle learn' procedure, which is
documented all over the place at www.hondasuv.com.

'Curly'

 

www.upullandpay.com has several wrecking sites nationwide.
They advertise the price of basic parts online for several
of its locations. A throttle body goes for about $22. Bring
the core and get about $3 back on that. Factor in a couple
bucks for admission.

The one local to me is great. Prices online are what the
site has.

Wrecking yards where a person does not get to do their own
pulling tend to charge a lot more, in my experience.

 

and experience is what you gain from most. if you pull your own part,
chances are that when it comes to your own vehicle, there's no more
learning curve - any mistakes were made on the junk vehicle. all this
for the price of admission. absolute bargain.

 

Thanks for that tip!