New Unicorn Daily Driver

In reply to Erich :

Ive never had wheels refurbished but did find a quote of well over $100/ea to have it done. So if the wheels are available new for $130 it wouldn't make any sense to refurb them. 

Winter came. 

I bought a PowerStop brake upgrade kit for the Accord, which was a good deal since I needed new pads and rotors at all four corners along with two sticky calipers that needed rebuilt. After a sale, all four calipers, rotors, and pads were under $500 through Rockauto. Cracking into the brake lines proved problematic, and I've been left with a somewhat mushy pedal that seems to have returned to about baseline after a thousand miles of driving. I may invest in stainless lines come spring though.

This winter in Michigan has been no joke, and I'm still commuting about 100 miles round trip each day. I ordered a set of closeout Altimax Arctics from Tire Rack mounted to steel wheels. I opted to downsize to 15" wheels, and the high-profile snow tires certainly make the car a lot squishier on the freeway. They are incredible in deep snow however, and I've had no issues even when the roads are unplowed and the median has had 10+ spinout accidents on the way to work. 

I'm due for an oil change, and if it ever warms up a little I'll change the manual trans fluid as well. I've been averaging about 26-27 mpg, mostly on 80 mph freeways, which I consider fantastic for how I have been abusing the gas pedal. Best tank so far was 30mpg.

This is beyond my budget, but here's one in NY:

https://hudsonvalley.craigslist.org/ctd/d/2007-honda-accord-ex-v6-6/6457038037.html

In reply to Woody :

I think that's a decent price. It's probably more expensive than I would have traveled for, but had it popped up locally I would have bought it. 

For posterity's sake, the one Woody linked to is $8500 with 77k miles. I paid $5800 for mine, 112k miles. 

In reply to Erich :

Do you have any idea how many of these were sold over the course of the two years that they were available?

In reply to Woody :

 Here's my educated guess - Autotrader shows 892 '06/'07 Accords for sale nationwide, and 6 of those are V6MT Sedans. Cargurus shows about 2,000 Accords of all kinds for those model years, and 17 of those are V6MT sedans. That gives us a range of between 0.6% and 0.8% of all Accords sold in 2006-2007 being V6MT sedans.

I'd guess Honda sold about 700-750,000 Accords in 2006 and 2007 model years, and so if we assume it's 0.7% of ~725,000 cars that gives us...

Probably about 5000 cars in those two years. I'd say that jives with the number I've seen for sale and on the road, which is very few.

I’m surprised that you’ve found that many currently for sale. There’s one on eBay right now. I’ll check Cargurus and Autotrader. 

This 2007 in MA is the best and lowest-mile example I see, but again for a bit of a premium price. Otherwise there are a few with about 120k miles on Autotrader for a little more than $6000. That's the sweet spot to me. 

The one on ebay looks ok, but certainly no better than others available now, and a little more expensive. 

Wish I had put this in build threads. Not that it will ever be much of a build mind you. 

This week the weather took a legitimate turn towards spring, despite the morning frost, so I did some freshening of the Accord. 

First the interior. The leather seats did pretty well over the salty winter months considering, but the kids' slush-covered boots seemed to touch every surface in the car. I ordered a set of WeatherTech floor liners, and got a set of seatback protectors and modified a rear seat blanket to protect the seats from grimy kids. Much better. 

Next was fixing a notchy transmission. Apparently 3rd gear is well known on these Honda 6 speeds for grinding and popping out of gear. Mine definitely grinds but thankfully no pop outs. 

There is a TSB addressing this but obviously I'm well out of warrantee. I decided to try a fluid change before more aggressive measures, and boy am I glad I did. 

I used GM Friction Modified Syncromesh on the advice of others, and it's made a night and day difference. Shifts are smooth and accurate, no grinding at all, just like you would expect from a Honda manual. 

In reply to Erich :

Moved to builds.

Thanks ECM. Your moderation is greatly appreciated. 

Last spring cleaning item was a big one. Honda alloy wheels really hate salt. I mean really hate it with a passion. A look around a parking lot in Michigan will tell you this. The winter brine seems to get under whatever clear coat Honda puts on its wheels and slowly but surely oxidizes the aluminum underneath. Eventually it gets bad enough that tires don't make a good seal and you have to refill them weekly. No bueno. 

That's where I was at when I removed them for the winter. Two tires didn't hold air for more than a few days, one sidewall had a nice bump in it, and when I looked up the date stamp, they were from 2010, and the tread wasn't more than 3/32". Pretty toast, so I scrapped them when I put the snow wheels and tires together. 

That's the exterior corrosion, and in the work parking lot I've seen far worse.

So needing both wheels and tires, I feel I have two options: Option 1: more motorsport-friendly lightweight wheels that are wider than the stock 17 x 6.5 inch wheels, and fit the widest tire I can, or Option 2:  try to find a nice set of the stock 5-spoke wheels, for originality's sake and because it's a focus of what makes this particular car subtly stand out from the average Accord. 

How did I miss this? 

I now have the 4cyl 5spd coupe version of this. So the same car, but absolutely completely different. If your car is like the rest of the Accords of this generation it should have a 14mm rear sway bar. The 17mm bar from an Acura TL of the same generation fits and in the case of my car was exactly what it needed to make it much more neutral. The good news is that they're cheap in the junk yards because who want's a Acura sway bar? 
Shock options for these are limited, but it looks like Bilstein B6's from the same generation TSX should fit with a bit of a spacer on the rear knuckle. I say should because nobody in the country has a complete set and hasn't for the last couple months. The word I've heard is that these are on the build list at Bilsten for sometime in May, but we'll see how that works out. 

Many thanks for the transmission fluid recommendation. I don't like how mind shifts at any RPM above 4k so hopefully this will help. 

Every day I'm shocked at how good these are at being cars. 

Erich said:

Next was fixing a notchy transmission. Apparently 3rd gear is well known on these Honda 6 speeds for grinding and popping out of gear. Mine definitely grinds but thankfully no pop outs. 

There is a TSB addressing this but obviously I'm well out of warrantee. I decided to try a fluid change before more aggressive measures, and boy am I glad I did. 

I used GM Friction Modified Syncromesh on the advice of others, and it's made a night and day difference. Shifts are smooth and accurate, no grinding at all, just like you would expect from a Honda manual. 

I did this with my "OneLap TL"... and it was a pretty big difference.  I've also read that the syncros prefer a "diagonal" 2-3 shift (instead of up-over)... and there's a english... or rhythm it likes.

One other thing I did was add a "voodoo" knob... just because I've had one in almost everyone of my cars... although you might want a set-screw 'cause the ball almost acts like a short-shift, it sits that low.  but the weight helps with the throws, imho

In reply to sleepyhead :

Thanks for the tips. I'll see if adjusting my shifting style helps. I think I already subconsciously do it because I was noticing less trouble before changing the fluid, however my wife remarked on the grinding 3rd when she borrowed it.

I've been thinking of changing shift knobs - my delicate hands already hate the metal and leather one the Accord shipped with. Who wants a metal knob in a hot car?

In reply to Erich :

then you probably don't want a voodoo... 100% Aluminum sphere 

In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :

I was looking at sway bar options actually. It looks to me like the TL Type S is the most aggressive set - 27mm front 20mm rear, both solid. I think the manual base TL has a hollow 20mm rear but might be 17mm. 

It looks like the parts for the complete Type S setup run around $200 new online, and they're thin on the ground at the local junkyards. Can't decide yet what I want to do but the car definitely pushes a lot in a corner. 

Edit: so it looks like the rear stabilizer bar for both early base manual trans TL and later Type S models is the same - 52300 SEP A11. The front across TL models changed from year to year and model to model, and I would guess the Type S is the most aggressive of those. 

I can confirm 20mm rear on base 6spd TL... dunno hollow vs solid...

I keep forgetting to check my rear swaybar size. 

I decided in the end to go for originality over performance in my wheel and tire choice. I found a set of new old stock 5-spokes, and fit them with BFG g-force Comp 2 tires. 

I'm happy with my choice for the most part - it looks good, and the tires stick very well for street tires, but they're a bit loud so far. We'll see if that calms down with some driving. 

I picked up at 2007 V6 6MT Sedan last month.  It was a 1 owner car with 90K miles in South Florida.  I've been catching up on some maintenance items with the timing belt, water pump, and alignment.  Transmission fluid and new slave cylinder with delay valve delete is next on my list.  I also need to adjust the rear parking brake and figure out why my rear defroster isn't working.  I'm surprised how smooth this v6 is, but I'm used to driving poorly factory tuned turbo cars with lumpy power delivery.

2nd in HS at Nationals this year, behind a Fiesta ST, was a 2010 Accord.  

In reply to blrb :

Nice find!!!

My rear parking brake was not working correctly after I replaced the rear calipers - turned out it was the new calipers. Sent them back and replaced again and it works now.

My BFG G-Force tires definitely quieted down, and they're great on the freeway. Unfortunately I swapped them out a few weeks ago for the General Altimax Arctics, so back to loudness!

My rear defroster works ok on the bottom but not great near the top. I don't know if that's normal or not for these cars.

Mine is still chugging along. City mpg is not fantastic - I get about 20-22 in all city driving, but I have a heavy right foot. 

That's about the same mpg I get with probably the same heavy foot.  I went to start the car yesterday, turned the key and got nothing.  Checked the starter relay, seems to be good.  Ignition switches seem to be notorious for going out on Hondas.  I'm going to get the starter tested too since it looks like the original one.  I'll probably start my own thread instead of hijacking yours with my maintenance musings.