Honda Problems

Have you brought it to Honda's attention through one of its dealers? If so it should have been fixed a long time ago, but if you haven't taken back to a dealer there's no way it could have been fixed. Changing the transmission oil, using a Honda recommended oil, would have been the way to fix it. Yours could have gone beyond the stage that it could be fixed with an oil change, but I would still consult a dealer to check.

I would doubt that you aren’t covered for this sort of problem. I would suggest you don’t park the car under trees, or anywhere else where leaves might fall on it while it’s parked.

Before you jump out of the Honda, head to a tyre specialist (Bob Jane T-Marts is usually good) and talk about switching to a quieter tyre. A change of tyres can really help and it's a lot cheaper than a change of cars.

The Accord Euro is designed to be an agile, responsive car with sharp handling and to achieve that the geometry of the suspension is set fairly aggressively and sportier tyres are fitted. Both of those things can result in higher tyre wear, and sometimes, uneven wear. It's a good idea to keep on top of the tyre rotation; so all four tyres wear at the same rate, ensure the tyre pressures are set to the correct pressure, and have the suspension aligned.

I would suggest you take it to a Honda dealer. They should be able to fix it, or send you to someone who could.

Things have changed since you bought the Civic, with most Japanese carmakers going backwards through the GFC. As for our Euro bias, we actually think the Koreans now make better cars than most of the Japanese brands.

It's too late for the local makers but there'll be a big battle over grey imports.

Don’t do it. It’s usually a waste of money if you’re prepared to keep the car clean and polish it very occasionally.

So you still have to consider the Mazda3, which definitely gets The Tick. Forced to choose, I'd take the Focus because it's a nicer drive and the Civic is really nothing special in 2014.

I doubt that it's related to the automatic gearbox, the engine is running roughly and is sluggish when cold. That points to a problem with the cold enrichment of the engine, and I would be getting it hooked up to a diagnostic analyser and checking things like the sensors that supply information to the car's computer.