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what car do you recommend if I had this criteria?

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Buy a car you can afford to pay cash for and stop worrying about labels and looking cool.

I personally like the new Camry, although Camry is traditionally a boring middle aged person's car.
 
Accord, Camry, Fusion, or Sonata. Out of those I think the Sonata is the all around nicest vehicle. Drives well, looks decent, nice interior, and great bang for buck. That's if you want mid-size saloon car. You didn't specify what type of vehicle you were interested in so I assume you want one similar to the Accord.

$30-$40k gives you a lot of buying power on the used market. This includes some very high end luxury cars. Just remember that luxury cars require luxury maintenance. That is to say that if they do need repairs, they're costly.
 
Since you live in Virginia and like you prior Accord, I would go up a step. Test drive the Honda Crosstour. It's basically the Accord big brother. It is very similar to the Accord except it is AWD. In Virginia winters, you will likely need this. Your requirments:
1) this vehicle runs about $36,000 depending on options
2) has automatic transmission
3) does not require premium gas
4) has the Honda quality
 
Kroze said:
Source or are you assuming?
Click to expand...

Parents' V6 Hondas owner's manuals. (If you want page numbers you'll have to wait until next Christmas when I'm visiting family again.) I believe that Honda may have changed this on newer models, but I do know that the Pilots recommend Premium when towing anything over 3,500 pounds. This would tend to indicate that the ECU cannot back off enough to allow the use of regular when the engine is loaded above a certain point.

Or were you asking about my source for the Acura comments? You know, the comments for which I explicitly used terms like "may" and "AFAIK"?

ZV
 
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My previous '09 V6 manual Accord listed regular gas in manual. No premium at all. Same for current Pilot.

Edmunds lists the '13 V6 as regular gas as well.
 
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Zenmervolt said:
Parents' V6 Hondas owner's manuals. (If you want page numbers you'll have to wait until next Christmas when I'm visiting family again.) I believe that Honda may have changed this on newer models, but I do know that the Pilots recommend Premium when towing anything over 3,500 pounds. This would tend to indicate that the ECU cannot back off enough to allow the use of regular when the engine is loaded above a certain point.

Or were you asking about my source for the Acura comments? You know, the comments for which I explicitly used terms like "may" and "AFAIK"?

ZV
Click to expand...

I was asking for source of your claimed statement: if you want the rated horsepower of Honda V6, you have to use premium fuel. I never heard such a thing from Honda, only Hyundai turbo 4 cylinders.
I know that the Honda versions only "recommend" premium fuel. Basically, if you want to get rated power, you do have to use premium, but the engine management computer has sufficient range of adjustment to allow the continued use of regular fuel without damage.
​
 
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Pens1566 said:
My previous '09 V6 manual Accord listed regular gas in manual. No premium at all. Same for current Pilot.

Edmunds lists the '13 V6 as regular gas as well.
Click to expand...

The Pilot most assuredly does mention using premium in the owner's manual. Both the current model and the generation before it. Regular is fine for normal use, but both the first and second (current) generation Pilots recommended using premium fuel when towing.

Since I apparently need to provide references, see pages 495 and 549 of the 2012 Pilot owner's manual for current generation models and pages 186 and 220 of the 2006 Pilot owner's manual for first-generation models.

In either case, the comment that the differences come down to ECU tuning stands. Mechanically the Honda and Acura engines are substantially similar yet the Acura models call for premium (see page 188 of the 2006 Acura MDX owner's manual) despite the fact that the MDX uses essentially the same engine/transmission as the Pilot.

The differences are due to the way the ECU is programmed, not to any substantial modification of the engine's mechanical components which is all I was saying.

ZV
 
Kroze said:
I was asking for source of your claimed statement: if you want the rated horsepower of Honda V6, you have to use premium fuel. I never heard such a thing from Honda, only Hyundai turbo 4 cylinders.
I know that the Honda versions only "recommend" premium fuel. Basically, if you want to get rated power, you do have to use premium, but the engine management computer has sufficient range of adjustment to allow the continued use of regular fuel without damage.
​
Click to expand...

Any time a manufacturer says that premium is "recommended" but that regular may be used without damage, they are saying that you won't get rated power all the time from the engine when using regular fuel.

The ECU retards ignition timing, and may employ other strategies as well, to avoid preignition when running regular. This results in power loss. That's just how it works. Any time the ECU has to pull back timing to avoid preignition because of regular fuel being used, you're getting less power.

On a cold day with a light load, there may not be any cutting back and therefore no power loss. But, for example, while towing or with 4 or 5 people in the car on a warm day, you're going to be hitting situations where the ECU is pulling back the timing pretty significantly which reduces power.

Now, if the ECU is not designed to ever advance the timing enough to need premium, then running premium won't help. But if the manufacturer recommends premium in certain situations and you don't use it, then even if the engine can compensate and avoid knocking, you're still not going to get rated power.

The Pilot recommends premium when towing because the additional load creates a situation where the ECU can no longer pull back timing enough to avoid preignition reliably and higher-octane fuel is necessary to avoid that.

ZV
 
I'm with ZV, unless Honda has broken the limits of physics, or foregone proper fuel/air management optimizations (this is crucial so that you can run varying types of fuel available in various regions, different octane/ethanol/etc levels), then the J35 Honda motors are definitely sensitive to fuel choice, running a bit better when Premium is used, while still operating perfectly fine with 87. Basically every modern motor setup AFAIK does this, though many indeed see little to no gain with premium.

Source : previous J35 vehicles.
 
Zenmervolt said:
AFAIK, it's mostly engine management tweaks between Honda and Acura engines. I know that the Honda versions only "recommend" premium fuel. Basically, if you want to get rated power, you do have to use premium, but the engine management computer has sufficient range of adjustment to allow the continued use of regular fuel without damage. Acuras may have a different ECU calibration that doesn't allow the use of regular gasoline though.

ZV
Click to expand...

For a 2012 Honda Crosstour 6 cylinder engine, here is straight from the owners manual P. 282 on Fuel Recommendation:

"Your vehicle is designed to operate on unleaded gasoline with a pump octane number of 87 or higher. Use of a lower octane gasoline can cause a persistent, heavy, metallic rapping
noise that can lead to engine damage."
 
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Raizinman said:
For a 2012 Honda Crosstour 6 cylinder engine, here is straight from the owners manual P. 282 on Fuel Recommendation:

"Your vehicle is designed to operate on unleaded gasoline with a pump octane number of 87 or higher. Use of a lower octane gasoline can cause a persistent, heavy, metallic rapping
noise that can lead to engine damage."
Click to expand...

Uh, 87 is 'regular.' They're saying 'if you use gasoline that has less knock resistance than the cheapest thing commonly available, your engine will knock.'

This does not disprove anything ZV said. Logically, there are really only two explanations for Honda's differing recommendations: ZV is correct in his assumptions, or Honda is friggin' retarded.
 
Raizinman said:
For a 2012 Honda Crosstour 6 cylinder engine, here is straight from the owners manual P. 282 on Fuel Recommendation:

"Your vehicle is designed to operate on unleaded gasoline with a pump octane number of 87 or higher. Use of a lower octane gasoline can cause a persistent, heavy, metallic rapping
noise that can lead to engine damage."
Click to expand...

So...I hope you know 87 octane is regular right?
 
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