[Dippy]

Originally Posted by sumeethaldankar

It used to happen due to the rain/dampness. What was done in my case was to disconnect the car battery for 3-5 minutes and then reconnect and it would go back to normal. The issue would repeat during heavy rains. By disconnect mean I would disconnect one of the terminals, hang around for 3-5 mins and reconnect it back. Post this the display will start to behave itself.

Thanks so much for this. I guess this is this is the cause in my case too. My car is damp because of the rains. I guess the dampness never went after my car went through water last year. I got ride of the mats but the floor is still went. And my car has been standing for a month now and yesterday checked there is fungus inside. Will get the car jump started and sent for cleaning and drying tomorrow.

[NTO]

Happy Diwali Everyone. Let us all get the strength to fight the bad and instill the good.

On this day, the festival of lights, I took up a DIY project to restore the headlights of the Civic. Your car may be new and pristine at heart. But, certain things like the headlight give away the age of the car. The haze formed does more than giving away the age and can also be a potential safety hazaard. Thanks to BHPian Saadat1992 for his thread click to read (Easy DIY: Restoring hazy headlamps on my Toyota Avalon). This was a great motivating factor.

The product I chose for this is Turtle Wax Headlight Lens Restorer. Bought it off Amazon from this link

The product contains the following:
1. A Clarifying Compound.
2. Two 2 sided pads marked 1,2 3 and 4.
3. A lubrication spray
4. Base lens wipe
5. Sealant wipe
6. A plastic hand glove (not a pair).

Other things needed:
1. Water
2. Two dry cloth (I used microfiber)
3. Masking Tape
4. Lots of strength and patience.

The headlights before
Right

Left


The Process
1. Use Masking tape to seal the paint work and apply the clarifying compound.


2. WIpe off the hazed clarifying compound and start with pad 1. Spray the lubrication and keep the surface of the headlamp wet and rub the headlamp in a forward and backward motion with the pad 1. Once completed, Use the pad 2 and repeat the process perpendicular to the previous direction, in the same forward and backward motion. Continue with pad 3 and 4. Keep changing the direction of rubbing from horizontal to vertical when moving from one pad to another.


3. Wipe off the lubrication spray with a wet cloth. Also wipe off all the spill overs on paintwork.


4. Apply the clarifying compound again and allow it to dry and form a haze.


5. Buff the hazed clarifying compound with a dry cloth and apply the base coat followed by the sealant coat. Ensure that all the 4 steps are completed for both the headlights before opening the base coat and sealing coat wipes. They dry off pretty quickly. You might need to complete the activity in quick succession.


End Result
Left

Right


Before and After Images



I would let you be the judge for the end result. Though the end result is not very satisfying to me, the overall process was satisfying and also it was a good morning workout.

[rr_zen]

Great efforts ! I agree with you the results could be better but the headlights are definitely looking much better that what they were. I have the same task to be completed on my 2010 Civic. I recently bought the Formula headlight restoration liquid from Amazon. Yet to find time to try it on my Civic and wifey's A-Star. Your post gives me the impetus to get it done soon.

[swami69]

Originally Posted by rr_zen

Great efforts ! I agree with you the results could be better but the headlights are definitely looking much better that what they were. I have the same task to be completed on my 2010 Civic. I recently bought the Formula headlight restoration liquid from Amazon. Yet to find time to try it on my Civic and wifey's A-Star. Your post gives me the impetus to get it done soon.

While the results are partly satisfactory to @NTO, I would suggest, do not try these on the head light, unless the headlight is a throw away case and you want to restore and drive for few more months.

With all my knowledge and DIY skills, I did the same on my Civic an year back and inspite of following every process, there were more scratches than earlier, but the haze was gone. Due the scratches, the light throw got impacted and eventually i changed both the headlights to a new one.

So, think about it twice before doing it OR give it to a professional in Pudupet/Chennai where i guess they do it nicely.

but, just a Headlight restorer paste would not harm that much.. pads will.

Swami

[NTO]

Originally Posted by swami69

With all my knowledge and DIY skills, I did the same on my Civic an year back and inspite of following every process, there were more scratches than earlier, but the haze was gone. Due the scratches, the light throw got impacted and eventually i changed both the headlights to a new one.

So, think about it twice before doing it OR give it to a professional in Pudupet/Chennai where i guess they do it nicely.

but, just a Headlight restorer paste would not harm that much.. pads will.

Swami

You are 100% correct. I feel that there are a lot of scratches on the headlamps now. The reason I tried this is that, the rest of the car looks very good but, the headlamps gave away the car's age. I am just scouting for the best priced stock headlamps. It varies from 9000 a pair to 15000 a pair. If I get good ones I will replace.

[swami69]

Originally Posted by NTO

You are 100% correct. I feel that there are a lot of scratches on the headlamps now. The reason I tried this is that, the rest of the car looks very good but, the headlamps gave away the car's age. I am just scouting for the best priced stock headlamps. It varies from 9000 a pair to 15000 a pair. If I get good ones I will replace.

I got the OE headlamps from Ghai Spares in Delhi through courier. It was around 10K. I will PM you his number

Swami

[NTO]

March 26th marks 2 years since I bought the Civic. The first year was an absolute bliss. Thanks to the pandemic, I was able to do only 7000 clicks on the odometer in the second year. 3000 kms came from the two trips I made with family towards the end of the second year. I would like to thank the following BHPians who helped me in different ways during the two years of my ownership.

1. BHPian swami69. He helped me with a contact in Delhi to procure headlamps for my civic.
2. Distinguished BHPian Laluks. He helped me with my clarifications on Dhanushkoti, end of land.
3. BHPian Astonite. He accompanied to two of my trips this year and finally ended up buying a used Civic AT himself!

Let me start with a renewed list of likes and dislikes after two years of living with the Civic.

Likes

1. Stellar reliability. Crank up the engine and leave. Only thing that you should ensure is to fill fuel.
2. Cheap on the pocket. For the size of the car and the performance it offers, the maintenance is very pocket friendly.
3. Good space on offer. Both for the passengers and luggage.
4. Good ride and handling combination.
5. Very easy to drive despite the size.

Dislikes
1. Tank Range: I am not complaining about the fuel efficiency here. But a bigger tank size would have definitely helped on my longer trips.
2. Ground Clearance: The ground clearance is very bad to say the least. Even after being extremely careful, I ended up scraping the belly a couple of times.
3. Rear seat comfort for tall passengers. The rear seat is aplenty for normal sized adults. For taller occupants, other than the shoulder room, everything else is rationed. Be it, under thigh support, headroom or leg room, everything is compromised.

Since the last update on this thread these are things that happened with the car.

1. Headlamps changed: The headlamps were the sole give away of the age of the car. I tried restoration at home and outside as well but, all in vain. As BHPian swami69 rightly pointed out, the cleaning activity on the headlamp only made it worse. So, I decided to replace them. Procured them from the contact provided by swami69 and I received the headlamps in under 5 days of me transferring the money. I got them installed from Jai Prakash at German Tech.

Picture with the old headlamps


Dismantling the headlamps is quite a task. A lot of parts had to be removed!




New eyes installed on one side


Completed picture


2. Dash camera from NSV: Installed a dash camera from NSV on the Civic before my trip to Yercaud. I got it installed from Jeewajee car jewels Anna Nagar, Chennai. Please ping It has very good recording quality. It also has motion sensing features and starts to record when the car is parked and a motion is detected. Very useful. Let the video recorded do the talking.

This 3 minute video was captured while moving up hill of Yercaud. The Octavia seen in the video is BHPian Astonite's Octavia 1.8 TSi.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZiHlSMI1bM&t=48s

This 25 minute video was captured on the way back from Yercaud to Chennai. Somewhere in the middle, the first accident was caught on the dash camera. A dood with his scooter tries to cut through two cars, mis-judges the cap and ends up in a crash. He however escapes with minor bruises, lucky him. He will also be seen without a helmet. This incident made me realize the value of Dashcam. If I am in a pickle, the video from the dashcam will prove useful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnoKeSLd-tE

A video recorded from BHPian Astonite's Octavia showing Civic gliding through the roads of Yercaud.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcYD-dfFE8Y

A picture of Civic with BHPian Astonite's Octavia


3. Leather steering wrap: The OE wrap on the civic's steering wheel started to show its age. It became shiny and slippery. Hence I removed the OE wrap and re-wrapped with very high quality leather. The steering now both looks and feels great.


4. A thorough detailing: I gave civic a thorough detailing inside out at a new place in Anna Nagar called Anna Nagar Auto Spa. These guys started their business right before Covid-19. The only reason they survived is because the place belongs to them. They some how sailed through the pandemic and their team was also not laid off. Very sincere guys and the charges are also very nominal.

Few pictures after detailing.




5. Trip to Rameswaram: Special thanks to Distinguished BHPian Laluks for answering my questions. It gave me a lot of confidence to proceed with the trip in my civic. My intention for the trip was two folds. First, to make the best use of the time around republic day for a family holiday and second, to take the Civic to end of land. Here are a few pictures from Rameswaram.















6. Got the car serviced from Jai Prakash After the rameswaram trip, I got the car serviced from Jai Prakash. the car is good to go for another 7500 kms.

During this one year period, I tried to do do two purchase from two of Indian e-commerce sites. Once bitten, twice shy, I have decided not to order from any of the Indian e-commerce websites. Pathetic overall experience, in face I lost some money. Topic for another thread and I will post that shorly as well.

Thank you all for reading and wishing you all prosperous and a healthy life!

[varunanb]

Originally Posted by NTO

March 26th marks 2 years since I bought the Civic. The first year was an absolute bliss. Thanks to the pandemic, I was able to do only 7000 clicks on the odometer in the second year. 3000 kms came from the two trips I made with family towards the end of the second year.

Thank you all for reading and wishing you all prosperous and a healthy life!

Congratulations on your civic. Wish you many more happy kms on it. Ive been using mine from feb this year after a break of not using it regularly in the last 3 years. How I missed the steering and handling of the car.

Off late its become my daily driver and have done about 5K kms in feb and March. ODO is at 125K and still going strong and car feels fresh. Maybe, we should take the civic including Swami69's for a drive.

Also, you've put a 7.5K kms service interval, any specific reason for this. Mine is only on need basis and sometimes when the oil is good, the gaps were as long as 14/14.5 kms. 7.5 kms looks too short.

[NTO]

Originally Posted by varunanb

Congratulations on your civic. Wish you many more happy kms on it.

Thank you very much. Ownership like yours with 125K on the odo gives me also the confidence to hold on to the civic at least until it requires the first RC renewal.

Originally Posted by varunanb

Maybe, we should take the civic including Swami69's for a drive.

That is a great idea. We can do a drive. It would be great. I am sure BHPian Astonite will also join us for the ride with his Civic.

Originally Posted by varunanb

Also, you've put a 7.5K kms service interval, any specific reason for this. Mine is only on need basis and sometimes when the oil is good, the gaps were as long as 14/14.5 kms. 7.5 kms looks too short.

There is no specific reason. Since I bought the car used, I just wanted to ensure everything is in good shape as I use the Civic as a family car. I was following a 5K service interval with Honda and now 7.5K with Jai Prakash as per his recommendation.

[varunanb]

Originally Posted by NTO

Thank you very much. Ownership like yours with 125K on the odo gives me also the confidence to hold on to the civic at least until it requires the first RC renewal.

Civic is a keeper. FC is early next year for mine. Wanted to complete 140K kms before that. Now have to see how close I can get before that.

Originally Posted by NTO

That is a great idea. We can do a drive. It would be great. I am sure BHPian Astonite will also join us for the ride with his Civic.

Most welcome. Need to put a stop to the atrocities by the chennai bhpian's in fiesta's.

Originally Posted by NTO

There is no specific reason. Since I bought the car used, I just wanted to ensure everything is in good shape as I use the Civic as a family car. I was following a 5K service interval with Honda and now 7.5K with Jai Prakash as per his recommendation.

Just check at the 7.5k km mark for any thinning or discoloration of oil. Most likely for our chennai city driving and long highway trips, it would still be as good as new. You can change them at a longer intervals. Unless its all peak traffic time drives. Keep an eye on the air filters too.

[Dippy]

@NTO: Nice to see your Civic doing well. I especially liked the steering cover you have installed. Any info on how it was fitted and the cost?

My Civic mid life refurbish is now complete after I got new tyres. All that remains now is to change the head unit as the touchscreen Caska unit that came with the car has aged and now has a blue tinge on it. Found a 10 inch Android based screen that I might go for in the coming days. Might change the rear view camera as well.

[NTO]

Originally Posted by Dippy

@NTO: Nice to see your Civic doing well. I especially liked the steering cover you have installed. Any info on how it was fitted and the cost?

The steering covers come in specific diameters. It is a pure leather unit and costed me Rs. 5000 inclusive of installation. It was hand stitched at my home. The car accessory person sent his guy to do this job.

Regarding head unit, here is a post of mine. Overall the thread itself is quite useful
https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/car-e...ml#post4977240 (Sony vs Pioneer Head-Units)

[Raja_babu]

@ NTO: Nice to see one of the nice CIVIC's. I was intended to buy 2007 civic, however things postponed due to the pandemic situation. Now I am in the negotiation of CR-V. Could you mind to suggest any person to check thoroughly like your angel. Thanks a heaps.

[NTO]

Originally Posted by Raja_babu

Now I am in the negotiation of CR-V. Could you mind to suggest any person to check thoroughly like your angel. Thanks a heaps.

Awesome. CR-V is a great car. Take it directly to one of the Honda showrooms, I got mine checked at capital before buying. They charge around ~2000 for this. You evaluate current situation and also previous service history!

[Raja_babu]

Thanks for the suggestion NTO. However will the dealer allow us to take the car for service centre. If not, what can be done?