So i posted before about trans problems. It turns out my trans is gone. So i am going to say screw it and swap to manual. I did it to my 240 how hard can it be on a cl right? plus i believe honda drills all the holes in the frames for the clutch pedal, and master cylindar already anyways. So my main question is what all is needed to do the swap. I know i need....
Manual trans
Clutch
Flywheel
Linkage's
pedal assembly
clutch master cylindar
trans mount
and i will eventually need a manual ecu, but if i dont have the money wont need to do it right away.
I will probably need about 100 dollars in lines, and fluids as well.
Am i missing anything to do the swap? i think that would be all i need, but just want to double check.

So far i have the trans mount, a clutch and a flywheel. The rest of the parts i should be able to find for 500-800 dollars from what i have found at various junk yards. For anyone that has done it is it a pretty easy swap? ive tried searching but didn't find anyone that, any help would great. Thank you very much. Chris

 

if you've done it already, it should be too bad the second time around...keep us posted on how it goes

 

Well i actually did an sr20 swap in my 240.. the 240 sucks cause all the holes needed to be drilled, but everyone i know that has done one on a civic has said they are already there. The 240 was pretty easy cause it was also rwd, vs fwd. Ive never dropped a fwd trans, but it cant be that hard. Thanks for the quick replies though.

 

I have the ECU from my 98 2.3 5 speed in a box (im running a chipped ECU now). PM me if you are intererested.

 

I swapped my auto tranny on my 2.3 with an h22a4 5 speed tranny. In my honest opnion for the amount of time and money spent converting it is not worth it. Its gonna cost at least $3,000. If you want a 5 sped. rebuild your auto tranny for around $1,000 sell your CL and buy a 5 spd. Even if the swap is done perfectly and there are no problems at all, like in my case. When you go to sell your car no one is going yo want to buy it and its deffinately not going to be worth the $3,000 you put into.

 

Ouch yeah that is painful at 3g.

 

wow you grossly overpaid. You can get a tranny for 400-500 dollars and the spare parts for no more than $250. Install takes about 5 to 6 hours if you know what you are doin. Easier with the engine out, but still doable with it in.

 

Yea, how the hell did u spend that much.. You coulda done an h22 swap for that. Even paying a shop to do the labor, if i end up not wanting to try. i can get it installed with a new clutch for 1300... Ive found numerous trans for the 400-500 dollar range all with 30-90 day warranties. i hopinh i can find a junkyard soon that will cut me a deal on all the misc parts i need if i buy it all from one place. and the idea with converting the car to manual is so i can drive it.. Cause to fix the auto is going to be atleast 1800-2200 dollars. and that is a a minimum.. Once i go manual not alot can go wrong, just change clutches every 50-60 k.. and if the car makes me another 60 k, it will be long paid off, and if no one wants to buy it, it will still make a good beater, or extra car.


Ps... does anyone know if u need a different starter for the manual conversion? also can anyone else that knows what there doing go over my list and let me know what i am missing. i dont want my car all torn apart and find out i need a different starter, or so stupid part that i didn't think off. Thanks, Chris

 

Maybe I overpriced what it costs to do the tranny swap. I paid about $1,700 for the tranny swap and that includes the price of the tranny. I was able to get my h22 tranny for $400 but I had to drive like 300 miles to pick it up. And we used alot of new oem parts instead of used. But in any case I still wouldn't do it again.

Try using this website for useful info on the tranny swap http://www.extremeredline.net/accord/automanual.html . And yes you will need a 5 speed starter.

Also keep in mind that if your going to use an obdII ecu it will have to be reprogramed by Honda due to the imobilizer unit. I ended up using a '95 Accord EX ecu so I wouldn't have to go that route. The bad thing about using the obdI ecu is that you need to do a lot of wiring work and get new plugs.

 

you can use a 1996 ecu its obdII and no imobilizer. They started doing the imblzr in 97. Otherwise a JDM ecu wont have an imoblizer untill 2000. It will give you a lil more hp too.

 

Hmm, everywhere i have looked for 5 speed starter for a cl, the manual and auto cl's have the same part number?


Also what the hell is the imobilizer, and what does it do? and isn't there a way around it? i will just use the auto ecu for a while if i cant just throw a manual one in. Thanks, Chris

 

cant use the auto one. Wont work if the auto tranny is not there. The imoblizer makes it so the ecu wont work unless the key that goes with it is present. Most dont come with the original key and cylinder for it.

 

So i can use a 96 usdm obd2 ecu and it will work? what cars can i get it out of? a prelude, or accord? and what jdm ecu's willw ork until 2000? prelude and accord? Also how much wiring is required to go with one of these ecu's or is it pretty simple? thanks.

 

if you stay obdII you dont need to do any wiring. It just plugs right up. you will want to use the accord ecu because the prelude wont make your engine run right.

 

Guys the '96 ecu is obdII but it has the same plugs as obdI ecus which will still require wiring work. It might be a cheaper to call a Honda dealership to program a '97-'02 ecu for you than to have to pay for all the wiring work. The ecu needs to be from a Honda Accord EX '92-'97, Acura CL 2.2 or 2.3 '97-'99 or a 4 cylinder Accord '98-'02.

And by the way you can use your auto ecu, I did for a couple of days before I ordered another ecu. Problem with the auto ecu is that the speedometer and odometer don't work. The car redlined at 5k rpm and therefore could not use vtec. So you will need a 5 speed ecu if you want everything to work correctly but an auto ecu can be used.

 

Or... you can spend $100 and get a conversion harness. For some reason i thought that 96 ecu has the OBDII plugs. Not really sure.