Dealership service tech- "We need to replace your cabin air filters because they cool the EV motor"

kunz427

kunz427

Member
Was told this during my second service. They wanted $185 for the engine and cabin filters and not replacing them would cause "dirt" to go into the ev motor. First experience where the dealer tried to use they're lack of knowledge about the Clarity to bamboozle me.
 
kunz427 said:
Was told this during my second service. They wanted $185 for the engine and cabin filters and not replacing them would cause "dirt" to go into the ev motor. First experience where the dealer tried to use they're lack of knowledge about the Clarity to bamboozle me.
Click to expand...

Which dealership?
 
The lack of scruples and integrity of most dealerships never fail to amaze me.

Both are easy peasy to replace in about 2 min.
The engine air filter will not need replacing on Honda’s usual schedule since for most of us, the ICE doesn’t run that much. Note that the Maintenance Minder appears not to separate out HV miles and so will probably indicate replacement long before it’s really needed. Just adjust according to how much HV driving you do.
The cabin air filter is behind the glove box and all you have to do is make sure the arrow (air flow) is pointing down.

Make sure you pick up some genuine Honda proton polish and electron lubricant to keep the battery in tip top condition. (Insert sarcastic font)
 
From Majestic Honda online parts the Honda cabin air filter is $14.XX and the Honda engine air filter is $19.XX. The set could be shipped to your front door for about $40. So the dealer in the OP basically wanted $145 to install them. Since a tech could do both in about 5 minutes, that’s a pretty high hourly rate.
 
So I’ve been thinking about dealers and the challenges they face because I’ve had a terrible time with my local Toyota dealer. Instead of charging $185 for those 2 filters on the Clarity and generating suspicion and fear in the customer about being ripped off both then and in the future, what if the dealer had said “It would be a good idea to change the engine and cabin air filters. They cost only $35 for both and we’ll install them for free.” That service dept. would get a customer for life and be able to sell a lot of service to a happy customer in the future.

Oh well. I know.......in my dreams.
 
Thanks for reminding me about the filters. I've had my Clarity for about a year and a half, so far, with about 11k miles on it, and the cabin filter should be ready for replacement. I watched a couple of you tube clips showing the cabin and the engine air filter replacements, and was quite surprised how much debris and dirt the cabin filters had collected.

I've been pretty happy with our local Honda dealer so far, but the thought of paying the high dealer prices for the filters, and the really really high labor costs for the trivial filter replacement tasks is pretty hard to swallow. Replacing air filters is something I can still manage, even at age 80.

I just ordered a set of filters from HondaPartsNow. I haven't used them before, but their website part search UI is good, and the prices were low. The ResellerRatings on them is very high, so I'm hoping for a good result.
 
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