My buddys ASPEC transmission started slipping gears than a few minutes later it was toasted and won't go into gear at all now. Do you think the car going to need a new transmission? I know these cars are known for bad trannys but man I had a 02 Type S and its over 300,000km now and its original tranny still smooth! The aspec is at 290,000km but it was never neglected at all, excellent shape! never winter driven , it seems very strange for it to just blow out randomly like that.

What do you think?

Thanks

 

The 2nd Gen TL's 5 speed AT was a poorly engineered and flawed transmission from the start in 2000 models up until about 5 years later. The tranny's can go bad often times even when properly maintained. It's all a roll of the dice as to when they end up failing.

The best fix is to find an updated "AV6" tranny to directly bolt in and replace the old existing TL's tranny with. They are an improved design and proven more reliable.

 

pretty good lifespan on both! Acura techs will tell you anything over 50kMILES is ripe for failure

how is that car- and yours- on the atf changes? running the newer Honda DW-1 atf?

often what happens is the clutches in a gear or 2 are failing, throwing particulate matter/crud into the fluid flow,
Once in the Torque Convertor it gets slung outwards into the filter screens, drops the operating pressure and suddenly it wont shift at all

Letting it cool off - parked- for 15-30 minutes, lets crud drain back off the screens and allow short operation- 15-30 minutes= to get you off the highway to safer parking

If that's the case= a used accord trans is looking better every day!

How does the fluid look and smell?
at correct level- BETWEEN the 2 dots - not at either and definitely not above or below !!
Ck per owner book method/temp of fluid, some are cold- some are warm

To really know whats happening I would drain a 3 ounce sample of the atf and send to blackstone labs (in USA)- there may be similar place in Canada,
look up `oil testing` on the internet

For 20 or 25 U$D they mass spectrograph the oil, then a human interprets the readings and compares to every previous test of that same fluid they have done

whats in the fluid and in what concentrations will tell if the worst has occurred
In my opinion that's the best thing to start with- get the fluid tested = cheap and informative results

As a maintenance item- having the engine oil and atf Mass Spec'd will keep you ahead of problems