I never found any concrete instructions on how to change the M/T fluid on the 6speeds. All I gather so far is the 10mm bolt on the bottom of the tranny, but how much fluid do we put in?

Also, if someone would be so kind to scan the helms manula of the service, that would be great. Thanks in advance.

 

you should find the picture in the owner's manual at page 251
(or you can find it here :
https://techinfo.honda.com/rjanisis/....ASP?YEAR=2003 in PDF format, maintenance section, page 251)

quantity is

For fluid change: 2.2L (2.3 US qt, 1.9 lmp qt)
For overhaul: 2.5L (2.6 US qt, 2.2 lmp qt)

 

Well timed question....was thinking today that I need to do this as I've noticed a little stiffer shifting lately and coming up on the 30k mark. Does anyone have any recommendations as far as MT fluid goes....Honda recommends their stuff, but I know when I had my old Prelude a lot of folks used the Redline stuff in them....any recommendations?

 

There's no reason to change MT fluid for maintance. This is not an auto tranny.

 

your tranny won't break down if you don't do it, but it's for the best to replace it.
smoother shifts after will be felt.
it's time to take the old oil out and tiny metal parts out. oil looses it's properties with time, it's not only valid for the engine oil.

honda MTF is good, but Redline is better.

we try to have our customers do it at every 48k km at my dealership, and sometimes when i pull the plug, it's VERY dirty and thick. you shouldn't wait until it's dirty to replace it, it's already too late (putting new oil will be good, but so much dirty oil and metal particules left in the casing), keeping it clean is the best way to go

and it's only like $15~$20 for oil if you do it yourself ! redline will cost like $25~$30... that's cheap maintenance for expensive parts

 

thanks for the helpful information zero.

what situations would require an overhaul?

 

even though there's magnet to trap metal particules in the tranny, not changing the oil contributes to adding more particules between every parts, and when the bearings have been rolling into too much metal particules for too long, they start whining. to take it worse, the syncros won't move as fast as they should and you will kinda scuff the syncros teeth's heads and wearing them faster than normal, reducing the gap between the syncro and the gear. but i'm talking very exagerated long term here.

if driven normally (not going hard on gear changes nor crunching gears through hard shifts), you would have to change the bearings at first. most of the time if a little aggressive driven, we replace the 3rd-4th syncros because the are worn (smaller gap than specifications between syncro and gear, but most of the time because of rounded teeth ends on 3rd syncro : they come in a kit where it's 1st-2nd, another kit for 3rd-4th...) + reverse idler gear ($50)

all bearings come to around $300 maybe i think, but syncros or gear kits are $350 each + reverse idler gear ($50) + about 6 hours of labor i guess (auto trannies take 4 hours to replace + alignment)

if only whining, you can only replace the bearings.
if unable to shift gears at high rpm, the bearings won't necessarly whine, but because of the worn parts, metal particules will get into bearings wearing them.... automatically replacing all bearings for that repair to take no chance a bearing would whine a while after the rebuild.

most common situations for overhauling a tranny would be :
- whining from the bearings
(bearings)
- hard / unable to enter gears at high RPM shifting
(bearings + syncros)
- hard / unable to enter gears at mid RPM shifting when worse
(bearings + syncros + gear(s))
- hard to enter gears at any rpm (bent shift fork....but that's rare and mostly happens to dumb drag racers forcing hard fast gear changes)
(bearings + syncros + gears + fork(s))

also sometimes bent shafts, noisy/broken gears or differential ring gear when abused intensively

 

Great information Type S Zero, mods can we put this in the FAQ and/or DIY section? I did a search on how much fluid is needed for the M/T and I never was able to find it. Might be good informations for members.

 

Zero - thanks for the great information - looks like I need to pickup some Redline and get around to it. I'm hoping to notice at least a small difference - i've been getting the second gear bind that everyone talks about in the cold and noticed the tranny doesn't shift as crisp as it used to.

Thanks again for all the great info.

 

Still see no need to do it as maintance. If your having problems, or need to open the tranny up fine. But not at 30K miles or any regular interval.