AtWhatMileage
Engine · 17 owner reports

Other engine problem on the 2009 Honda Pilot

2 fires 2 of the 17 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.

Reports of this failure 17
With an odometer reading 12
Reports per 1,000 built 0.2 per 1,000
Filed below 36,000 miles 33%
Mention a crash, fire or injury 2
Typical repair $300–$4,000
What it means when it happens High
Rank among this year's problems 3rd

When other engine problem gets reported

Owners of the 2009 Honda Pilot report other engine problem at a median of 80,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 25,000 miles and a quarter after 125,000 miles, from 12 reports that carried an odometer reading.

A part like this is normally expected to survive 95,000 miles. It is the 3rd most-reported problem on this model year.

The mileage distribution

The reported range runs from 1,600 miles at the tenth percentile to 155,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 151,236 miles across the middle 80% of reports.

When the reports scatter this far, the mileage is telling you about how these cars were driven more than about the part itself.

33% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.

The whole distribution

Percentiles of the 12 odometer readings owners gave.
10th25thMedian 75th90th
1,564 miles 24,115 miles 80,000 miles 125,500 miles 152,800 miles

Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.

What a percentile can and cannot tell you here

These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.

What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.

Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.

What happens, and what it costs

Of these reports, 2 a fire is mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.

Putting it right typically runs $300–$4,000 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.

The same failure on other years

The same failure is reported on 22 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2013, at a median of 2,500 miles, and latest on the 2008 at 120,000 miles.

By volume the 2016 carries the most reports, with 485; the 2009 has 17. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.

If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.

What owners wrote

Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.

I bought a new 2009 honda pilot two month ago. I have driven 1350 miles on it. I could not start my vehicle after a week sitting in my garage. I have to jump or charge the battery in order to get it started . This had happened four times since I bought it. *tr

1,353 miles NHTSA complaint 732917 filed 2009-08-25

Tl* the contact owns a 2009 honda pilot. When attempting to start the vehicle, it exhibited a no-start condition. The vehicle was towed to the dealer, but the technician could not identify the cause of the failure. Two days later while driving on the highway at 60 MPH, the vehicle began losing power. She was able to safely coast to the side of the road. The vehicle was towed back to the dealership, in which the converters and injectors were replaced at her expense. The engine warning light illuminated on the instrument control panel. The vehicle was towed back to the dealer, and a technician concluded that the engine had to be internally inspected. The manufacturer was notified, and she was awaiting a response. The current mileage was approximately 3,500. The failure mileage was 3,461.

3,461 miles NHTSA complaint 745083 filed 2009-11-20

Tl* the contact owns a 2009 honda pilot. The contact was driving 50 MPH when the vehicle would suddenly stall without warning. The contact was able to restart the vehicle within several minutes. The vehicle was inspected by the dealer but the vehicle was neither diagnosed for the failure nor repaired. The manufacturer was contacted as well and offered no assistance. The failure mileage was approximately 100.

100 miles NHTSA complaint 844139 filed 2011-02-25

Also reported on the 2009 Honda Pilot

Excessive oil consumption

18 reports median 125k

Airbag inflator rupture

18 reports median 119k

Other body or interior problem

12 reports median 30k

Other suspension problem

10 reports median 52k

Premature brake pad or rotor wear

8 reports median 58k

Seat belt or retractor failure

7 reports median 69k

How far this goes

Complaints are voluntary, so 17 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.

Questions this page answers

At what mileage does other engine problem happen on the 2009 Honda Pilot?

Across 12 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 80,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 25,000 miles and a quarter after 125,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.

How common is other engine problem on the 2009 Honda Pilot?

17 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.2 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.

What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars

Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed