Fighting an uphill battle......

So I like to think I take decent care of my vehicles. Washed 2x a month at least, wax/sealant every 3mo or so, claybar, park in the shade when possible. Children tend to change priorities.

Noticed one day, out of the living room window, a blemish on the roof of my wife`s 2013 Honda Pilot EX-L in taffeta white.

I proceed outside to inspect and the paint has literally peeled off in a sheet about the size of a sheet of paper between the windshield and moon roof.

Paint thickness measured anywhere between 3.1 on aperture between doors and roof and 4.6 on the doors themselves. Car only has 49k miles to date and Honda isn`t approving any warranty work.

Google search comes up with plenty of complaints so I don`t think I`m the only one. Wish me luck!!Attachment 34795

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Another angleAttachment 34796

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I’ve seen it a couple times with the white. Stick to your guns! Contact the attorney general in your state.

Reminds me of my 1979 Ford Ltd II! I thought the days of primer and paint problems was over. Yes my 1979 was bought new by me. I hope you win your fight. Keep us informed.

MarkW.II --
Sorry this had to happen to you..

Tell Honda you want to talk to the Factory Honda Rep and have them make an appointment for you to meet him there and have him look at the vehicle..

Bring in or show him on your phone or the Dealer Computer, all the problems like yours on the Internet, preferably from 2013 models..
Another angle - find all the Honda Pilot Forums out there and search for this exact issue..

They need to make this right...

I can`t tell too well in the pics but it looks like there is no primer, sealer, etc.. on the metal..

If they screwed up and painted your vehicle and who knows how many others without putting down something first, for the paint to stick to, well its no wonder its coming off in sheets..

You mentioned some measurement numbers - was that a total thickness meter, or the most expensive DeFelsko $3k meter that is the only one that can measure layers??

If you measured total thickness in Mils, then that 3.1 measurement = 78.74 microns, total thickness of material - not very much at all to work with, if it is divided up between primer, perhaps a sealer, paint, then clear coat, or paint and clear coat...

1 Mil = 25.4 Microns.. I only measure in microns, so I can tell if even a little bit is removed when correcting paintwork..

I also had a new Chevrolet Truck in 1986 that had paint peeling off and the Dealer took it back and repainted the entire thing so it would all match again and have no more issues..
Guess the Factory guys smoked the crack pipe too much that day they painted vehicles or something.. :)

You will need to ask the question - does this get ALL fixed (as in a complete paint job), or are they just going to repaint the top?? And how are they going to blend it into the rest of the vehicle?? What if the paint starts peeling off the hood, then the vertical panels, etc.. ???

Get ready to call Honda Factory, etc., if it comes to that.. And yes, as Mike Lambert said, get the State Attorney General on your side and that will make things move faster over there in HondaLand...

Good luck with this !
Dan F

Thanks for the feedback/suggestions! I never knew to contact the attorney general in a situation like this.

I struck out with the regional manager for Honda. I brought the car to local Honda dealer body shop and they recommended a complete respray of whole vehicle being how this is so common on taffeta white and pearl white. The primer doesn`t properly adhere to metal panels.

Google search shows the 07-11 Pilots had their paint warranty extended due to paint peeling. Day late and a dollar short right? I kinda figured they wouldn`t lay down and paint the whole thing without some sort of fight.

Honda factory here I come!! Will keep you updated.

Welcome to the world of water based paint. This has been going on for a long time and usually at the customers expense. I am not sure they will ever get this system to work like the previous paint system. Good luck with the fight and hopefully Honda will fix the issue. Keep a close eye on the vehicle, if it started there may be more to come in the future.

Dave

This happened with some batches of Ford`s Panther platform cars too. And a large % of those were white cars too...yeah, seems like the Primer doesn`t always adhere to the eCoat right.

MarkW.II- You`ve received good advice, hope things turn out OK. IF the dealer cares it can go very smoothly; it`s just whole-panel paintwork. BUT, OTOH...if the dealer and the manufacturer`s rep both blow you off it`ll be a question of how much you want to put into trying to get satisfaction. They will assume that you won`t really spend thousands of dollars and countless hours on it, which they themselves might be willing to do for various reasons. I`ve had the dealer/oem responses go both ways but genuine satisfaction is very rare IME.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MarkW.II

Thanks for the feedback/suggestions! I never knew to contact the attorney general in a situation like this.

I struck out with the regional manager for Honda. I brought the car to local Honda dealer body shop and they recommended a complete respray of whole vehicle being how this is so common on taffeta white and pearl white. The primer doesn`t properly adhere to metal panels.

Google search shows the 07-11 Pilots had their paint warranty extended due to paint peeling. Day late and a dollar short right? I kinda figured they wouldn`t lay down and paint the whole thing without some sort of fight.

Honda factory here I come!! Will keep you updated.

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No, you are not a day late and a dollar short - Honda has to or already should have extended the warranty to your year vehicle... It is still happening..

Glad the body shop gave you the same advice I gave you - needs to be a complete respray of the entire vehicle to insure paint wont be peeling off somewhere else in the future..

Just be totally knowledgeable about the past and present issues, confident, polite, and FIRM...

* Tell them their OWN Body Shop said they have seen this a lot and they recommend a complete respray..
* Tell them they want you to be an on-going Client, don`t they?
* Tell them there are dozens, hundreds, of future Clients watching this before they decide to shop this Dealership, etc...
* Tell them your Blog alone is viewed by tens of thousands of people daily..
* Tell them you want your beautiful Pilot to be whole again... That`s all...Whole again...

Good luck with this !
Dan F