How to fix vibration and shaking in a Honda Accord – it’s all due to broken engine mounts.
Here's how to fix that vibration and shaking that makes the steering wheel and dash shake on a 1997 Honda Accord.
I have a 1997 Honda Accord with over 180,000 miles on it (I have to say over because the odometer stopped working last year in December when it read 180,000 miles and so I don’t know the true mileage on it but it is clearly over 180,000 and maybe even a tad over 200,000 miles). This car is very dependable and gets great gas mileage.
One thing that, unfortunately, is dependable, but in a negative way is that the motor mounts keep breaking. Motor mounts should last 100,000 miles or so. I see them as routinely going bad every 30,000 miles or so. And you know when one or more of them breaks – the engine and the car start to vibrate or shake real fast.
The more of these engine mounts that are broken the worse it gets. At idle it seems to vibrate the worst and the whole dash shakes. A mechanic friend of mine told me this continuous shaking is what did my odometer in. The shaking probably knocked something loose inside the unit like a wire or a connection.
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The vibration and shaking stop whenever I have the engine mounts replaced. The car dealer charges way too much money to replace engine mounts on my old Honda Accord. I have found it much better to get a backyard mechanic off Craigslist to do this and I buy the parts online. I save a ton of money by doing this and the engine mounts last just as long as if I had the car dealer do it at their exorbitant prices.
AutoPartsWarehouse has engine mounts for my car at $47. Amazon.com has the engine mounts for $19 and Nextdayautoparts has them for $18. I price them around each time because the prices do fluctuate a little. The quality does not change however. I have bought a lot of these engine mounts over the years and they all last the same amount of time and work just as well.
I haven’t bought any bad ones so far. NextDayAutoParts tends to get me the engine mounts the fastest (in about 7-8 days). Amazon.com is more like 2 to 4 weeks. This is a little long, but with engine mounts its not like the car is going to stop running. You know by the vibration and shaking when the motor mount starts to go bad and also when it is more then one motor mount (more severe shaking that usually makes everything shake).
Once I get the part I call the trusty mechanic I found on Craigslist that actually works at the local Honda store (it’s now called Scott Clark Honda on Independence Blvd.) He only charges me $50 to put in one or both engine mounts and he can do it in just an hour or so. Just try and beat that price at a car dealership. Last time I checked at the Honda dealership they wanted over $1,000 in labor and parts – positively absurd!
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I easily save well over 90% in costs on both parts and labor by buying the engine mount online and then having a mechanic that is from the actual same Honda store do it on the side for me. If you have these same vibration and shaking problems you can pretty much guarantee that it is the engine mounts. Don’t waste your time or money at the car dealer. Go get the part online and then find a reputable mechanic through your local Craigslist.
