I took an 800 mile trip the past week and my 2014 RLX PAWS averaged 29.3 mpg as it was 90%+ highway miles. Twice while accelerating hard transitioning from an on ramp to Interstate flow the transmission temporarily hung up in a lower gear when I let off the throttle. This is a bit disconcerting to be going 70 mph and the motor is screaming in a lower than necessary gear for a couple of seconds. Anyone else experience a shift hanging incident? Other than those incidents, the car is a superb road cruiser.

 

I believe I may have seen this once in 1500 miles in my Hybrid, but I could never repeat it and it went away quickly. Travelling 70-80 for an hour or so and suddenly heard the engine noise increase, as though the RPM had gone up. Stayed for perhaps five seconds, then back to normal. Couldn't diagnose it any better because I wasn't tuned in to what the car was doing before this happened. I understand that the transmission in the Hybrid is physically different from that in the PAWS, but I assume they share some transmission software.

I would also add, though it doesn't apply to the PAWS, that the Sport Mode in the Hybrid sometimes gives me somewhat unexpected downshifts when I am not asking for them by accelerating hard.

 

Could it be the variable cylinder feature of the RLX where it can down to 3 cylinders to get better mileage?

 

^^^ Don't think the cariable cylinder feature is meant to increase the RPM.

 

There was an early video of an RLX failing to shift out of 1st at redline. I'm not sure of the cause or if there is a fix for it, but it seems to be very infrequent. Haven't heard any mention of it in over a year.

 

I played with Sport Mode a little over the weekend and in trying to upshift manually, found I could not between 4th and 5th. I'm sure it was user error. I've got a video of the experience, but because of work and travel, I won't be able to post it for a few more days.

 

Something that I have noticed with both the FWD RLX and the Sport Hybrid, is that when resuming from an ACC stopped situation and using the button on the steering wheel to resume, the system accelerates very gradually while remaining in the wrong (lower) gear for too long.

This produces an odd feeling that is almost disconcerting, and it usually causes me to take over to more quickly reach the cruising speed and get into the right gear.

If you don't do this, you face an almost embarrassing situation of having a car on your bumper while you accelerate too slowly while your motor's making a racket because it's two or three gears down from where you'd put it if you had a choice.

 

It's not necessarily user error. Even in Sport Mode, the car over rides what you're doing if it doesn't feel that it makes good sense.

I'm sure everybody's tired of my saying this, but tiny paddle shifters on the steering wheel are useless unless you're just trying to put on a show.

If you mean business then you will be shuffle steering and you will not be able to reach the shift paddles while you're trail braking or accelerating while still in the apex.

One of the very few things Ferrari does right: Their paddles are huge and on the steering column so that they do not move and are always in the same place.

Shuffle steering with Hondas is a way of life for enthusiasts, and if we mean business with this, we need to relocate the paddles.

 

This has happened to a few, mine has been as bad as it will slam the rev limiter and refuse to shift completely which will leave me stuck in 2nd gear. - report it to your dealer as Acura is aware there is a problem but they do not know the cause ye.

 

What are the symptoms that the car exhibits when it's on the rev limiter, please?

 

Have not experienced it.

However, If you accelerate hard you will hear the electric motors rev up and hold the gear.

 

You folks with the RLXh have a totally different transmission than us folks with the RLX PAWS.

The vast majority of RLXs out in the public hands are non-hybrids. My initial message was reaching out to the RLX PAWS owner community for their transmission experiences and feedback. The spate of recent informative messages from RLXh owners is welcomed as I hope to be owning a Dark Gray 2016 RLXh Advance at some point in the future (the 2014 RLXh Advances are pretty much gone from Acura dealerships). However, for now I am enjoying putting miles on my 2014 RLX PAWS and am looking for relevant feedback from my fellow owners of that version.

 

I know. I wanted to know what it felt like when the poster had experienced something that he thought was a rev limiter.

I've had an RLX Advance (P-AWS) before my Sport Hybrid, so I was curious.

Something that both cars have in common is that when using ACC Resume, they will both hold a lower gear too long.

In my experience, neither car gets up to redline, but both cars will accelerate automatically at a more or less leisurely and logical rate...except for some odd reason they've stayed in 2nd or 3rd gears far, far too long.

 

George, with your having owned both RLX versions, you have given us interesting information perhaps pointing to a common software programming aspect shared by the RLXh and RLX PAWS.

 

full blown rev limiter

The dealer took a datalog of my car at Acura's request and was unable to find the cause of the issue during the car not shifting, but recognized its not shifting.

- In fact temple of Vtec witnessed something similar during their road test of the RLX too

Here is a short clip of the car hitting rev limiter in 2nd, sometimes it will bang it hard and not shift till you nearly come to a stop which is not always possible... other times it will hit limiter for a second and then shift. - its completely random but you can force it to reproduce itself under heavy load in sport with an aggressive start. the loaner RLX I has also has this issue, could be software related on some earlier models.

Here is a video of it hitting rev limiter and shifting a second later.

 

here is mine failing to shift - crappy video but in this one I let off the throttle completely and then got back on it and it still refused to shift.
The other video is a random guy on Youtube who also has had the issue pop up

Here is a quote from temple of Vtec when testing the RLX

" Normally we will perform a run through the gears on the dyno for some eye candy, but this proved problematic with the RLX, as it would somehow "stick" at the rev limiter in either 1st or 2nd gear, whether or not we used the fully automatic "D" mode, automatic "S" mode, or manual "S", mode"