kongx7

Found this article.
Any one else with a 2.4L have this issue?

http://legalnewsline.com/issues/class-action/255206-transmissions-in-2015-acuras-arent-shifting-properly-lawsuit-says

SebringSilver

People never cease to amaze me.

TacoBello

LOL- only in America can you buy a $35,000 car and sue for $5,000,000 worth of "damages" even though nothing happened to anyone, beyond you being disappointed with your purchase.

Stew4HD

Agreed. I guess someone bumped their finger on the steering wheel when the car didn't shift right and needs a lot of $$ for their suffering

CheeseyPoofs McNut

Okay - let the betting begin - which AZ member is Roger???

I think the lawsuit is 100% silly - but I also have to wonder at what point should a manufacturer be held responsible for letting the first wave of customers beta test their vehicles? I realize the level of complexity has gotten so large that it's not likely to roll off a 100% bullet proof car these days - but clearly Honda had to know there were some issues. It didn't take us long to find them and we (the AZ user base) are a pretty small % of the actual people who purchased a TLX.

jeich182

I agree Mr. C.P.McNut. With the VCM system producing vibrations me and even my passengers can feel and more recently, the car having two eposides of unintended acceleration in reverse I'm not feeling as good about Acura as I have after any of the other Acuras I've owned. The hard 2-3 shift, which has now been fixed via software, sure, teething issues, but the other things are not acceptable and make me regret my purchase at times. My "luxury" car should not vibrate and NO car should accelerate by itself.

Cmyoung

Let me start by saying I love my TLX with a passion just as much as my previous tsx and a hugh Honda/acura fan ( minus the flat seats and the jerky transmission especially in sport mode). However, it is crazy how I just reported the same issue the guy is reporting in his lawsuit. Just last week from a cold start I pulled out of parking lot and came to stop sign to make a right hand turn and as I went out onto the road the vehicle acted as if it were stuck in neutral. I immediately look down at my gear shifter to make sure I didn't knock it into neutral and low and behold I gave it another push on the gas pedal and it finally decided to go after a few more seconds. Any more seconds out in the road Im almost sure the oncoming traffic would have rear ended me. This has happened on two-three occasions. I advised dealer about this issue last week when they did my upgrade for the cross traffic monitoring beep. Within three hours they told me my car was ready and that they couldn't reproduce the shifting into neutral feel.

Another week later the same thing happened again when I pulled/merged out into oncoming traffic. I have a little over 7000 miles on the vehicle and have pretty much gotten use to the jerkiness and clunkiness of the gear changes. I called the dealer back and they chalked it up to my driving style. Also, they mentioned that I was the first person that has brought this issue up. Frustrated, I have called Acura Relations and they said that unless the dealer can reproduce the issue and obtain a diagnostic it is pretty much an unknown issue that they can do nothing about.

NBP04TL4ME

As a coworker of mine says - "floppy eared jackass."

weather

...so this is the I4 with the DCT. It will be interesting to see how the ILX will make out. It is concerning and disappointing to see something like this on such an important vehicle for Acura.

I agree with Cheesey, while we can't expect a car to be perfect, car companies have a certain responsibility to deliver a product that is fully tested and shouldn't require numerous software updates. All this while being dismissive of the reported problems.

As much as I want to see a TLX in my driveway, I am concerned about all this stuff. I try and recall if Acurazine was as lit up when the 2009 TSX came out?

SilverJ

I saw this exact same behavior when I had a loaner TLX a few months ago.
I know people say loaner cars are beat to shit and all but I have driven many loaner cars, and none of them behaved like this one.
For any of you who have a TLX without any of these issues, good for you, you have a very nice ride to be excited about.

For those of you that have a TLX that has these issues and you still love the car, well, good for you I guess that you can look past it. There aren't enough jewel headlights in the world that would make me overlook a problematic transmission on a brand new car.

Stew4HD

Why aren't all DCTs affected by this if it is truly the transmission is truly defective? I ask because I see some here say their car shifts fine. Shouldn't all 2.4's do what the lawsuit is claiming?

$5 Million in damages? The lawyers are the only ones to make out on that deal, if it goes through. Not sure how they can prove actual damages but, then again, I am not an attorney.

The TLX haters on here will love this thread.

fsttyms1

Because it may be something like a batch of something say clutchpacks that may have a higher friction than what is supposed to be causing the issue. There are manufacturing defects that happen to from time to time that normally insignificant can just be enough to be noticed/cause issues. (not saying it is, just an example) Just like not everyone had a trans failure with the 2nd gen TL while others like myself had 5 (and they all had the design flaw)

lmacmil

I'd bet the lawyer came up with the $5M figure since he stands to get 30-40% of any settlement. Too bad we don't have a "loser pays court costs" system.

justnspace

iTrader: (1)

we only hate because the force is strong with you, stew.

we never want to see people hurt or get hit by a car because of the transmission not engaging properly.
Hope this gets cleared up quickly

jeremyw

A few AZ users also discussed their horrified experience with loss of acceleration with their TLXs at intersections due to the transmission problems (jump to neutral or does not know which gear to engage). If anything happened to them (let's hope not), the lawsuit will be much larger than $5 millions.

kongx7

I just came across the article earlier today and wondered who is all affected by this issue. Didn't mean to stir the pot and invite haters on to the thread, i am a acura/honda fan as well and want the TLX and ILX to be successful.
But my guess would be this issue occurred on the first batch of DCT's that were manufactured for the TLX. Or there were probably a few defective DCT's that squeezed its way through inspections.

SilverJ

Your defending your car to a fault. People aren't just making shit up, the car has transmission issues, its pretty well documented at this point. Just because your car doesn't have a trans issue doesn't invalidate the many that do. Consider yourself lucky.

jeremyw

Your words are INSULT to all the TLX drivers who are affected by the transmission problems. Seems like you think we are making things up. Now I wonder if you are somehow related to Honda/Acura or have some sort of conflict of interest to make this kind of defense for Acura. Well, perhaps my statement is too strong. Before you get mad at me, just google TLX transmission problems and you will see how many complaints on the web, given that only a small portion of affected TLX drivers actually brought it to the web.

Stew4HD

Yep, I work for Honda incognito... busted. I have so much to gain by coming here just to insult you. My work is done. Time to get my paycheck.

Actually, I feel bad for you guys that are having problems. I merely asked from a scientific standpoint as it relates to the lawsuit.

Stew4HD

Thank you for the answer. That makes sense. I was trying to wrap my head around why some and not others. That is what I get for being an engineer. It's either black or white, it works or it doesn't.. Mr. Spock was my hero . RIP.

BEAR-AvHistory

Its a mechanical device, there can be quite a spread between it works & it doesn't work. Seems like the defective ones work most of time but not all of the time.

Colin

IMO, hard shifting, slow shifting, etc. are subjective. Not understanding why the engine revs when slowing down (rev matching) is an education issue. However, the car not engaging drive, revving in neutral when Drive is selected is not. The difficulty is making the cars duplicate the problem. If they don't throw a code or duplicate the problem in the shop, it's hard to troubleshoot and fix.

CheeseyPoofs McNut

I.E., software problem.

LiQiCE

This reminds me of the 2G TL transmission issue. Early on when the 5AT first got put into the TL (and for whatever reason the CL-S/TL-S seemed to have more problems, probably due to the increased hp/tq) -- there were a bunch who had the problem, and some owners who refused to believe that it was more than an isolated issue. Common responses were that the owners with problems were beating on their cars, racing them or using Sport Shift Mode (aka Manumatic mode) too much (turns out driving in Manumatic mode likely helped prolong the life of the transmission).

Anyway - I just hope that this problem isn't as widespread as the problem on the 2G TL. Eventually I think most 2G TLs had a transmission failure - if you ever read the findings about the flaws in the transmission design - it was just a matter of time - all of the original 5ATs would fail. It took mine until about 60k miles to fail - but it failed.

It wouldn't be good for Honda / Acura if over time this became a widespread issue on the 8DCT - and even worse if they can't fix the problem quickly. It took a long time for them to design a new 5AT for the 2G TL that "fixed" the problem (really it is a bandaid fix but it would allow the transmission to go about 100k).

Ironically, in the 2G TL timeframe, the V6 tranny always were questionable - while the i4 trannies were bulletproof. In this case, its the opposite!

FredS

I have been contemplating buying a used RLX for six months but can not pull the trigger. I have been a loyal Acura/Honda owner for 25 years and 12 different models. The most recent RLX I was looking at was 45% discounted from it's original manufacturers price with being a year old and only 13,000 miles. The car fax report showed it was brought in to the dealer four times in six months for electrical service. I called the dealership and they said the lower screen (climate audio) was blacking out on a regular basis. They could not fix it. The last time the owner took it in three days later he traded it in at a local Ford dealership. Imagine the financial loss they took. Add this to the jewel headlights peeling, the seat belt retraction problem and the never ending suspension problem. The blind will say well these are new models including the problems with the TLX and this is acceptable. I say if you are paying $30,000-$60,000 you should not be a guinea pig for Honda. Something has happen at Acura over the last several years. IMO the designers have gotten it right with the five models but quality has taken a very far back seat. Those that do not believe me will be curious for your explanation of Acura's J D Power initial quality studies. In 2010 Acura was 2, 2011 #3, 2012 #6, 2013 #6 and 2014 #25 out of 32. This year we are behind Land Rover and Volkswagen. This June the 2015 survey will be out and based on all the issues on the different Acura forums I predict it will drop from 25.

Stew4HD

Thank you, that is what I was getting at in my seemingly insulting way. The issues that I have been reading about here do seem to be control related versus actual mechanics. I am merely speculating but id the car is revving and shifting, that seems to me to be computer (control) related.

Acura does need to address this in a more straightforward way! As I was watching "Better Call Saul" the other night, I saw several ads for the new ILX and in the ad, they all mentioned "With the 8 speed DCT!" I kept thinking that it wasn't something to brag about at this time!

Yikes

Interesting point.

During the late 90s and into the early 2000s, Honda had the worst stint of luck with their automatic transmissions. 2nd generation TLs were just one of the few vehicles plagued. Off of the top of my head I know:

6th generation Accords - both I4 and V6 models (1998 - 2002)
2nd generation Odyssey (1998 - 2004)
1st generation Pilot (2003 - 2008)
1st generation MDX (2000 - 2006)
2nd generation TL - mostly excluding the 1999 model year (2000 - 2003)
2nd generation CL (2000 - 2003)

The Accords of the day, even the I4s, experienced transmission failure, but not nearly at the same rate that the V6 models did. No so much because the V6 had more power, but because both designs were poor.

Honda pissed off a lot of people, a lot of whom were loyal customers who ended up getting screwed by these nightmare failures. Hopefully Honda handles these issues a lot better than they did 15 years ago.

9SpeedTran

I went through 3 transmissions on my 2000 Accord Couple EX, a grizzled vet in the service shop told me that Honda used the same transmissions with the V6 as with the I4 and that the V6's just tore them up. I was relieved that my driving style was only a "contributing factor" LOL

thoiboi

I'm glad someone brought up the previous gen's as well. I had a 99 Accord V6 that also was notorious for bad trannies too. Luckily mine is at 255K and only slips a bit. Still original tranny too.. *knock on wood*

weather

FredS....I am in a somewhat situation than you. I have been loyal to the brand and especially the dealer. I LOVE Acura products and what they stand for so owning the TLX is what I want more than anything but it is hard for me to pull the trigger when I read all these issues and they can't be ignored. I know all cars have issues but the Lexus Forum is not as lit up with problem as the recent Acura seems to be.

Poor out sourcing? Cost cutting? I am not sure how to explain it but for me, if at the on-ramp of a bridge and I keep seeing cars falling off the bridge, you can explain why I am hesitant to go on the bridge span. I would be so mad at myself if I got the TLX and have all sorts of problem knowing I had read all these threads and chose to ignore when I had a choice to buy another product.

If it wasn't for my dealership and how I will break the news to them, I'd have walked away a long time ago but man, this is killing.....almost have some anxiety telling them given HOW MUCH I respect and love these guys! It would be like saying to your partner you are having an affair....

SilverJ

time will tell on this. No one , regardless of what Acura they own, wants to see Acura release a vehicle that could be dangerous due to malfunction. Hopefully they can work it out over the next few years. I bought my Automatic CL-S years ago after hearing the same stories about the bad honda automatic transmissions. Mistake. Tranny failed 3 times. I haven't driven an automatic Honda since.

usdmJON

I wonder how many individual units must be reported as having an issue before a suit like this holds enough weight.

Obviously not all units are suffering from the same problem. And the units that are don't see the problem everyday. They work for the most part... Like 98% of the time.

So when do the problems of the few become large enough? What number of lemon transmissions would it take to no longer be considered a lemon?

I see a similar trait with the suspension noise the rdx and ilx have seen. I have owned the car about two years and not heard the issue so I don't imagine acura every making moves to solve an isolated issue.

Not sure the a faulty transmission can be considered the same as a suspension noise but how many transmissions need to show this issue before any sort of recall happened aside from considering the faulty ones a lemon.

weather

^^ You raise a good point. There is no doubt that some of the issues reported by the owners on Acurazine are worrisome, and I am talking about the cars exhibiting the feeling of a "gear slipping" for example. That, Acura should be worried about (as with the "lunging").

All the other reports of hard shifts and clunks while being unacceptable, I am sure will not be reported by as many people as we would think. Most of us on Acurazine are enthusiasts and are very passionate about are vehicles and the way they perform....I know every ticks and clicks my cars make. I know it will come as a shock to most of you but I am THAT anal! I can only imagine the amount of people that drive their TLX and would not even know the difference between a hard shift and a regular shift or other minor symptoms. The one about the "slippage" would be reported though...

I am not saying the problems you guys report are not real nor am I saying the behaviors should be accepted ---- it is just that we are so connected with our cars

a77

I have a customer who is thinking of trading his TLX for an Accord, for all manner of reasons. But he recently spoke to Acura Customer Relations who, he says, say they know of no problems with the transmission. If what he said was true....either staggering ignorance or a bald faced lie. I went in it and it behaved just like mine, ie no issues. Mine has once seemingly gone into neutral momentarily...I think...just long enough for me to think what was that about...and hasnt repeated, in 5 months of ownership. I find all autos have quirks of sorts - why I prefer manuals - you can only blame yourself for bad shifts.

BEAR-AvHistory

Unless you has a TL with poorly designed parts that required GM Friction modified gear oil & or a transmission rebuild under a TSB with gear replacement to fix.

Hondas' transmission history AT or MT has not been a good one.

CheeseyPoofs McNut

I suspect they have to say that - for liability reasons if nothing else. Plus they're in the business of selling cars - so they can't just tell anonymous blokes on the phone that their transmissions are having intermittent issues.

Treblig

Call it blind allegiance, wishful thinking or just plain denial....but I think whatever the issues they will be sorted out. I'm waiting on the 2016 model intro.

Colin

Just when you think you've made a statement that nobody would argue with...

BluePlanet

From April 2015 Consumer Reports magazine, TLX profile: "The six cylinder engine is a gem, with plenty of refined power, but its nine-speed automatic transmission shifts roughly."

As has been noted, this is a well-known fact at this point and I am disappointed that Acura hasn't said anything publicly -- to my knowledge, anyway -- about the transmission issue. The 15-year old Maxima I sold to buy my TLX shifted *much* more smoothly than my TLX. I am hopeful that the upcoming software fix can take care of this, but it is a material issue and I think had I known about it before my purchase last year, I would have waited for a fix, at least, or perhaps even changed my mind.

To be fair, other than this issue, the car has performed well.

SilverJ

So you change your transmission oil and call it a day. Honda is known for having some of if not the best manual transmissions in the business. And probably the opposite for their automatic trans.