1997 civic dx hatchback Vs. 1994 Civic VX which to buy???

[panamacolin]

Jad,
Thanks for the reply! Helpful! If you think of more please post them.
Colin

[GasSavers_Ryland]

the vx's engine turns 1/3 slower (2k rpm crusing speed insted of 3k) so things like the rings and valve guides should last longer, so far I haven't heard of anyone with a vx that has low compression, so that would give me the feeling that the engines are lasting alot longer then the crx hf's did.
in my expearince the most damageing thing to a civic vx is a teenager, they will swap out exaust, and engines, and add headers, they will destroy a car more then rust.
the timing belts have to be replaced every 90,000 miles or by the time you hit 120,000 miles you will have an engine that is scrap metal, your o2 sensor will most likely need to be replaced every 15 years costing up to $300, they rust out around the rear quarter panals, but that doesn't sound like an issue on the one you are looking at, I've has to replace my tranny after 220,000 miles because it had a loud main bearing, but you could hear that grinding sound with the car in neutral

[thisisntjared]

ordinarily i would prefer the 92-95 civic. but just because of the distance i would go for the 97...

[panamacolin]

im willing to take the ****ty 11 hour greyhound trip for a car that im going to keep for a long time...

[garyhgaryh]

I'll take a VX in a heart beat, even if both were the same price. The main reason is gas mileage and since you're on this forum, it's important to you.

I bought my VX in 2003 for about 2500 bucks and the car has paid for itself already. Fill ups are half the cost of my other cars ($50 bucks vs $24).

I bought it with about 170k miles and the engine ran like new. It has 233k miles now and my engine still sounds new. You should barely hear it when you are at a light and the car shouldn't shake from the engine being on. Listen for sound coming from engine compartment, esp from the tranny.

Things to watch out for. Since I had my car, my tranmission bearings went out. It's common with all Hondas of that era. The car sat around for 6 months while I figured out what I wanted to do with it. I didn't want to spend $1200 to have someone fix it so I ended up pulling the transmission and replacing all but two bearings at a cost of about $250-$300. Now it runs great and I'm using it as my daily commuter again.

Oh about the transmission, the main bearing housed in the tranny casing was destroyed - the ball cage self destructed and the tranny was litered with metal shavings. When the car is idling and the tranny in neutral, you should not hear any metallic knocking noises coming from the engine compartment. When I bought the car, the noise was not present. I guess it developed slowly. It got so bad that stopped driving it end of 2006. Finally got it running two months ago. The previous poster was right, at about 200k the bearings need to be replaced. Others have replaced theirs way before 200k - search on any honda site and you'll see this is a common issues with Hondas, not just the VX.

Gary