Civic Type-R Owners Club & Forum

Hello fellow CTR enthusiasts,

This is the last time I mention the running of a new engine… I PROMISE!

The reason I have posted this is that I was speaking to friend who is a Manufacturing Manager at Honda in Swindon and I asked him about running in of the car.

NOTE: This is just for information. It’s not meant to be a lecture on how to run a car in. It’s just for information (that may or may not have been posted previously?)

Right where was I? …… my mate said that there should be no real need to ‘carefully’ run in the car when bought. They don’t treat the engines with a great deal of care when they test them before coming off the production line. There are basically two tests they perform at the end of production:

Test for Brakes and wheel
Before the car is rolled off the production line, each car is put on rollers to test the brakes and wheels. The car is started and red-lined and then stopped to test the brakes. These series of tests are done from COLD…. No waiting for oil to circulate, no waiting for oil to get to best operating temperature.

Now remember that the guys performing these tests are not paid vast amounts, so their only concern is to get 300 units out by the end of their shift. So, the quicker they get the wheels to the correct speed, the better.

Road Test
The final test is to take each car on a stretch of track (approx 1 mile long) to check for rattles. For this test, the engine tends to be red-lined from cold so the test takes less time, hence more units through each shift.


He agreed with a dealers comments that “if you drive harder when you first have the car, the better the car’s performance will be”. However… there is a downside. Basically, by driving it hard initially you are loosening the engine up, thus reducing friction resulting in a little more power in the short term, but longer term…. There is a possibility the engine could get ‘too’ loose resulting in problems (note this is possible, not definite).

So if you plan to keep the car for the long haul, take it easy in the beginning to ensure the longevity of the car. If you don’t intend to keep the car for more than 5 years, then you could drive it hard to see the improved performance sooner. He reckoned that the engine is pretty robust and you will probably find that the engine will outlast the car.

So, when I get my car this Saturday I shall be driving not too hard (no v-teching) for the first 1500-2000 miles. Even though Honda test the cars with the engines from cold, I certainly won’t be doing any hard revving until the engine is nicely warmed up.

ROLL ON SATURDAY !!


- Jamziee

did he say if the engines are bench run first?

miner wrote:did he say if the engines are bench run first?

The engine and transmission are assembled in Japan and then shipped here for fitting. I would guess they are not bench tested in either Japan or the UK

evilowl wrote:

miner wrote:did he say if the engines are bench run first?

The engine and transmission are assembled in Japan and then shipped here for fitting. I would guess they are not bench tested in either Japan or the UK

Yeah, they just "guess" they might work cause they are bench tested, want be for long i guess but they will be run before plumbing into a car.

12 hours to assemble car, engines fooked, 12 hours to dismantle, 12 hours to reassemble.

Think they may spend 30 mins testing engine.

Jamziee wrote:
So, when I get my car this Saturday I shall be driving not too hard (no v-teching) for the first 1500-2000 miles. Even though Honda test the cars with the engines from cold, I certainly won’t be doing any hard revving until the engine is nicely warmed up.

- Jamziee

You will never last 2000 miles without vtec I can promise you that.

Drive the car sensibly for the first few hundred miles to bed in the moving parts (brakes, suspension etc etc) but as long as the engine is upto working temperature there is no harm in taking it to the right through the entire rev range.

You will never last 2000 miles without vtec I can promise you that.

I guess you're right

did he say if the engines are bench run first?

As for the engine bench testing... I'm not sure.... I didn't get the chance to talk to him in great depth. I'm going for a drink with him in a couple of weeks... so I'll have to give the the 3rd degree!!

I believe they have an engine plant at Swindon... so I'm not sure what they do in that part of the plant?

- Jamziee

There is something like 80% of engine wear occurrs, when the engine is cold.
The car will still be pretty quick running it in, what's a 1000 miles of mechanical sympothy !!

If they didn't bench the engines before bolting them into chassis, I think the production line staff would be a bit more wary of taking it directly to the redline from the first ignition! I doubt even the mighty Honda has a 100% success rate in engine manufacture/assembly.

at last count it was 2.5 million units without a failure.

maybe someone could dig out the honda pr quote to back that up.

2.5 million assembled engines, or 2.5 million engines in vehicles? I would be amazed if Honda weren't, and somehow got away without, testing (at least a large representative sample of) engines before putting them into vehicles. The OP spoke of tests specifically for the 1) brakes/wheels and 2) fit. Not the engine/drivetrain, which they expect to just work. You don't get that without some fairly solid testing procedures. I'm not trying to start an argument (especially since I'm the newbie on this forum), I just can't see it any other way. And I can't see there being 0 failures in 2.5 million engines put together. Maybe I'm just too pessimistic, and maybe Honda are that good. If they are, .

Thought the 2.5 million statistic applied to no engine faults reported to engines within cars within warranty period?

Can you redline it from cold?

Presumably yes but the VTEC won't cut-in.

surely they must test them all as every country has its own emmissions and noise laws so they would have to test to see that each engine conformed to these laws and to keep there high success rate of engines they must test them so they don't ship out a duff one

i didnt think VTEC worked when the engine was cold?

Engines are passed for noise and emmisions by design, not by individual units.

I'd be surprised if Honda run engines in Japan before the car is assembled, considering they'd have to add oil to every engine, connect up a full cooling system and electrics and exhaust whilst bolting it to something solid. Hardly the stuff of mass production, is it.

I may be wrong but I'd assume that the engines and gearboxes are shipped dry, as in no oil etc. from Japan. Otherwise every engine would have to be filled with oil, then the oil totally removed etc etc etc. There just isn't time to do it.

They dont run the engines in japan.
The engines are assembled in japan and shipped dry in a crate to swindon, then fitted and filled. Then the is car driven off the line.

Dipster

craigiusmaximus wrote:i didnt think VTEC worked when the engine was cold?

What I was guna say!

I smell something!

Jamziee wrote:
So, when I get my car this Saturday I shall be driving not too hard (no v-teching) for the first 1500-2000 miles.

- Jamziee

I thought a similar thing but I lasted about 200 miles....others on here laster about 2 miles. My mate got his from Cardiff and he left the Dealers wheel spinning with a cloud of smoke and he ragged it all the way home.

Is the oil drained after being bench run or is the original oil in the engine when you get the car?
so i was right then about them being bench run, knew i hadn't dreamt it

miner wrote:is the oil drained after being bench run or is the original oil in the engine when you get the car?
so i was right then about them being bench run, knew i hadn't dreamt it

Honda confirmed to me earlier this year (I was chatting to an R&D guy from Germany) that the engines are filled with oil in and bench tested after being built in Japan. They are then packed up with the gearboxes and shipped to Swindon to be "hand finished" before being sent to production as Mike states.

They are running whilst still on the line so to speak so again as Mike correctly points out the engines are not cold when they are tested by Honda (thats not good practice). Remember that this is a Japanese automotive company and not a French one!

EvoStu.