Hey A'zine,

I'm excited to be the new owner of a 2003 Acura CL-S black on black automatic. I had this exact car in 2005 with tasteful clean exterior mods, but never did any engine/power mods. I ended up trading it in for an 08' G37 coupe in 2010. I only kept the G for about 2 years. Then sold it, downgraded to a clean 01' Lexus ES300 for practicality since I was getting married and furnishing a new apartment. Ever since then I've been wishing I somehow kept the CL, my favorite car ever.

Finally picked one up about a month ago from an add I found online. Guy lived in GA so I flew down and drove it back to NJ. Getting behind the wheel of that car made me feel 21 again, the age when I bought my first CL. This car will not be my daily driver, and my goal is to restore it as much as possible cosmetically and do the basic bolt on power mods that I never did to my first one. I literally plan to keep this car forever. If/when tranny goes probably will replace with AV6, comments on that welcome. Not interested in doing a MT conversion, I prefer driving an AT (although I know I will be in the vast minority here!) I'll try to post some pics as I make small progress.

 

Nice car man. I love the no spoiler look and I wish mine was like that.

 

congrats! glad you're aware of the AV6 option. Grab some headers!

 

congrats! I have had my cls for 13 years now and still enjoy every chance I get to drive her. Georgia has very mild winters so I am sure you got one without rust.

How many miles/price?

 

I just got an 03 CLS too with the classic bad transmission. 234k and I plan on putting an AV6 in the next couple of weeks. I got mine down in Huntington, WV. Beautiful car!

 

Thanks for the comments guys. I paid 5k and the car had about 137k. 2 owners both in GA. Very clean, hard to find any rust anywhere. However, I did notice that the dashboard instrument panel (#7 in link diagram INSTRUMENT PANEL for 2003 Acura CL) was very warped so much so that the long rectangular vents under the windshield don't even sit right. I suppose that could be due to the GA heat. I'd love to have it replaced one day although i know it would be extremely expensive.

The car had very good records of maintenance viewable from the car fax report. I didn't see any mention anywhere of a tranny being replaced so this one may be an original. I saw the transmission was serviced at 121k, though I'm not sure exactly what that would have included.

 

First order of business was getting the vehicle serviced, so I brought it to my garage and had them do a pretty comprehensive inspection/140k service, aside from taking apart anything major.

-Replace air filter
-Clean cabin filters
-Replaced spark plugs, n6k laser plat
-LOF service
-Transmission fluid change, Honda ATF-Z1
-Coolant fluid flush, Honda type 2
-Replace rear brake pads
-Full inspection of brakes, belts, hoses, engine mounts, water pump, underbody, driveshaft boots, exhaust system, fluid lines, fuel lines, cooling system, etc.
-NJ state inspection

 

So I decided to clean my engine bay. It wasn't bad to begin with, but it definitely needed to be freshened up. I think it came out looking pretty good.

 

clean car! looks to be in excellent shape.

down here in the south you dont have to worry about rust!