matcron391

Here goes. For those that have read my other posts. Have already guessed I am nuts with too much money. After this post you will no longer be wondering about that.
After failing at rebuilding the tranny. $600 in parts on a car with 286,000 on the odometer. Don't know if you don't try.
So late one night after months of procrastinating over which one to go with the car. New tranny verses used tranny verses having the old one rebuilt. Verse doing the full jdm swap. I went with the full jdm engine tranny swap. The jdm swap with 25,640 miles was $1499 plus $350 shipping to terminal. New engine and tranny mounts $100 new oem shift solenoids for American cars. $350. New having the jdm daco torque converter cleaned. $75. New radiator $112. New tranny cooler $33 new cv boots For both sides $60. Case of dw1 tranny fluid $135. Having the transmission for the jdm tranny inspected and having a new internal filter and gasket installed $300. New intake gasket set $38. New external tranny filter $35. New oil filters and spark plugs about $140. Plus another $35 for aniti-freeze. New timing belt $50. Tensioners were fine in both engines. $30 for a new abs wheel sensor. While waiting on all the mentioned parts to come in. Sent the car out the have the rust free body painted and dings pulled out $850. Because the brakes and suspension was just rebuilt prior to purchase. Didn't have to fix it. Replaced drivers seat from donor car at junk yard. $100. Ending results. One pretty much new 1999 acura tl that is being used by the wife. And she just loves the car. Could I have bought an acura tl running and driving cheaper. Maybe. But then the transmission would probably of been going out in it to.

Why did I put so much into the car. A couple reasons. Now I know what I have for car. The other is. Not so much as facing failure of Not fixing the car. As spend the rest of my life listening to the wife saying I told you so every time we see an acura.

What you need to know about jdm engine and transmission. You have to change out all the sensors from you old engine and transmission. There not the same as the American cars. Different voltage. Thank fully the vendor I bought the jdm drive train from. Told me that the sensors had to be changed. And explained why.

In no way is it cheap to do the swap.
Cost.
Car $1250
Repairs $3500 plus.
Total cost was $4750 for a car that started a new life with 25,640 miles on it.

Total cost is a rough estimate it could be more. Never really added up the receipts. Just focused shutting the wife up.

kevinf41

In my opinion is a great investment and you get the keep the wife quite lol I love my 2nd Gen TL. when I bought it I always said I would keep it till the end.

My TL is the only car I actually feel very comfortable in and I have owned accords, civics. lexus, evo, rx7 and jeeps and none them compare to the comfort of the TL.

I just got a used tranny with 97K miles on it, next will be the engine as it has 202xxx miles on it.

matcron391

Cool. The jdm was the best deal. I'm going to send out the old tranny to have it rebuilt with the updates installed some day. After reading tons of blogs about the tranny problems. It seems like a better plan to keep a second tranny on hand. But for now I have a couple of other cars and a few different projects to get started and finished. Will post a few before,during and after picture's of the acura.