Evilocity

Hello Everyone,

I'm currently having some issues and came to these forums seeking help. Last Monday on my drive home from work I was on the highway going about 80km an hour and medium rush hour and the car went into neutral and down shift itself to what felt like the 2nd gear. Luckily no one was immediately behind me (it's an automatic) I kept pressing the gas but the car won't go over 40/km speed wise. The RPM just keeps shooting up, it won't engage a higher gear for the car to go faster, I then tried to put it into Trip-Tronic or sports shift mode but that didn't help car still won't go over 40km/h. At this point I figured high lining the RPM so much can't be doing the car any good and pull over to emergency lane. I ended up getting the car towed home, but the weird part is when I got home I turned the car back on and everything is working again... I couldn't believe it. Just spend $150 on tow truck and this thing is working again.

That same morning before I went to work, I encountered something strange. When I went from Park to Drive there was a hesitation of like 5 seconds which was never there before.

So fast forward this story 1 day and I take it to the dealership and describe everything, they came to the conclusion that my Transmission needed to be replaced and they quote me $8500 + Tax. I asked them if they could reduce the price or share cost or if they could do anything because ideally I would like to keep the car as it only has 139,000km and the street value my vechical is probably $8000 and I just bought winter tires from them few months ago too for $1300. They said they can't do anything. I also asked them what error codes came up on their diagnostics or how they knew it was the tranny. They then tell me just my driving it the tech knew right away, there is no need to open up the car because its too much labour. I said fine but let's do something about that price..... nothing.

I found out the Acura Dealership that I goto has their transmissions work done by a speciality chain called Mr. Transmission here in Canada. So I took the car to them and on my way there while the engine is still cold the car had a major delay going from 2 to 3. by the time i got to Mr. Transmission the car was warm/hot.

When I got there The service manager/lead mechanic at the shop took my keys and told me to get on passenger side to test the car out. We tested the car for 30 mins and nothing, car seems to be working again. Then I told him about the Park to Drive has a delay that wasn't there before. He said oh thats normal, he said something about the engine needs few seconds for the oil to get in there for the gears to engage. Normally soon as I shift from park to drive i step on the gas, this mechanic gives the car like 2-3 seconds everytime....where as I don't give it anytime i press the gas soon as it's in the D.

We then went back to the shop to get his computer, he hooked it up to the car and we went driving again this time for about 40 mins and we couldn't get the car to slip gears highest speed we went was 100km/h. He inputting a bunch of stuff on the little machine he has hooked up.

He told me the car is not returning any transmission error codes and he is not seeing any gear slippage to warrant a full replacement of the transmission as the problem could come back even if transmission is replaced as there are a number of electrical problems that could be the culprit. I then told him I've never changed the transmission fluid in this car because i'm an idiot. I should have changed it at 100,000 km and now its 139,000km. He said that is fine as what I described to him is not caused by simple transmission fluid and that I could be wasting as much as $180 dollars. but my way of thinking was it needs this change!! manual says this should be changed at 100k but i guess he knows whats best. He basically told me to drive it around for a few more days and to come back to him soon as i see the problem and not turn the car off. Only problem with that is I need to get on the highway to drive to work and I'm too scared to do that at this point as I don't trust the car.

At this point i'm not sure what to do, I don't want to get into an accident so highway driving is out of question. Any thoughts? I seen a bunch of people here on forums replace this device called selnoid only for the problem to come back and then some say to not change transmission oil and some say I absolutely should. So confused any help would be greatly appreciated.

01acls

Change the atf 3x3 and external filter and call it a day.

MarcDavidoff

Well..I read thru your post and to be honest to me it sounds like your Trans is on the way out just by the issues you are having. Did anyone ever look at the fluid to see what it looked like. I have to believe with it never being changed that it is not pink anymore, but with the slipping issue you had the other day it is likely burnt now too. If you search around this section and especially the 2G generation TL you'll see tons of folks that have had similar issues. I'm sorta surprised you didn't get any codes thrown. A delay going into gear from park of more than a couple seconds shouldn't be considered normal- ESP 5 seconds. Sounds to me like you have debris clogging up the trans and when you stop and shut the car off a lot of times the debris settles until it has a chance to clog orifices and filters again. You can try changing the fluid and the external filter and see what happens

Evilocity

Thank you for the advise guys, I will try the 3x3 and external filter on the weekend and report back. The last mechanic didn't look at the fluid but when i looked at it through the dip stick it looks black no pink colour at all.

MarcDavidoff

How does it smell? Black sounds bad, but if it also smells burnt then that really doesn't sound good. I don't know if you want to throw 10qts of rather expensive dW1 in there if it's too late anyways. Maybe try Maxlife fluid for imports- Walmart should have it. It may buy some time not sure..?
I have an 02 and my torque converter had been acting up for some time. Ive changed the fluid quite a few times in the last year along with the filter but I was really just delaying the inevitable with mine. The torque converter finally went out while I was on he hwy. the trans started slipping badly. After it cooled down I was able to limp it home but the fluid is now tan and smells burnt.
Every situation is different so who knows...

ErickUa5

I would try a drain and fill however as mentioned above its on its way.
Let the old fluid drain for about 30 minutes, then fill with 3quarts of Honda ATF.

There should be a code just not visible to the generic OBD II scanner if thats what they used.
My friends 3G TL had he same failure as yours and it all started with 3rd Gear slipping, I hooked up a scanner that can read the AT module and sure enough there was a code for 3rd gear pressure switch but nothing on the OBDII side until the check engine light came up. Eventually the car stopped moving and had to get it rebuilt.

JasonK

Hey. Sounds like your transmission is on the way out. These 04-08's are notorious for failing trannies and they eventually need to be replaced. That's why people that have the car I tell them to change their tranny fluid every second or third oil change.

flyromeo3

I think no amount of fluid changes can prevent the trans from crapping out.
Changing the fluids might extend its life but these clutches do wear overtime causing these problems.

if you get more than 150k out of an original transmission is outstanding. I would change my trans fluid every other oil change and yet it still failed.
Although it failed at 174k, I was hoping for more out of it.

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JasonK

I don't understand what a clutch has to do with the actual transmission wearing out? Pretty unrelated. Yes that's the point of doing the tranny fluid change every other or 3rd oil change is to extend the life of the trannies on these 3rd gens.

musiclevelz5

The clutch "IS" what is wearing out. In this case the third gear clutch pack. It is the issue in 99.9% of the failures of the 00-08 V6 transmissions in all of Hondas vehicles during that time period.

The rest of the transmission is typically fine and looks new when pulled apart. The third clutch pack friction discs are worn down so much that when third engages its like engaging steels only and slips like mad. Sometimes when the frictions gets worn down too far it causes the piston sleeve to pop out far enough causing serious scalding and ripping into the third gear clutch drum.

Guess where all the worn and broken friction material go? Straight to the internal filter where it gets slowly clogged up to the point the transmission starts to whine from lack of pump pressure. This is also why the torque converter whines. This is why you lose all gears and not just third.

No amount of fluid changes or intervals will keep the third gear clutch from wearing out since the problem is widely known to be pretty much unfixable. (I dont personally know where the issue is but I suspect its because of lack of fluid lubrication to the third gear drum.) The only positive effect clean fluid will provide is keeping less friction material from building up in the filter until the third gear frictions go up in smoke and slip as they always do.

Evilocity

I took the car to a mechanic and changed the Transmission Fluid I told him i wanted to do the 3x3 but he said was waste of money and that 2 x 2 would do the trick so I did that. Now the car changes gears perfectly and no slippage. The 5 second delay went away regardless if I put the car in park or drive. However in the morning after the car has been sitting outside for 10 hours over night If I don't let the car idle for 10-15 minutes to warm up there is a delay of 3-4 seconds for the vehicle to engage the gear. If it is warm and is being driven in the day the delay is non existent now. Probably on it's way out but drivable now, will probably have to get rid of it this summer if it last till then which I'm thinking it will actually because it drive just about perfect right now minus the morning.

Nostradamus

WOW, I feel for you, most likely your transmission will completely break down. This happened to me on last 2 Acura TL's before my 2008 model. Transmission cracking or breaking is a known problem by Acura people and they told me it was fixed after 2008. but still I hated having this issue.
You tell Acura to replace your transmission for you at NO cost. Tell them you know about the existing problem with older models.

Jackass

I don't have an auto, but isn't the delay one of the signs the pressure switches need to be replaced?

Evilocity

BINGO, you were right my friend. 2 weeks later the transmission complete broke down. The car is no in the shop, I was told that my torque converter went out and let something into or by pass the filter causing damage and over heating the transmission. Will be costing me 3300 after tax with 20,000km or 12 month warranty. been given the option of extended warrant @ $495 giving me 3 years or 60,000km.

p.s dealership refused after i told them about about recalls, they simply said you ain't covered.

Evilocity

sometimes, but looking at your transmission fluid and smelling it while car is on will erase all doubts. If its black and smells like crap then you know your problem is serious.

MarcDavidoff

When mine went and was slipping badly, I could smell the burnt fluid inside the car. And it still smelled a bit inside the car weeks after I had the trans swapped to an AV6 accord trans.

Forget the $3300 on a rebuild. Look for an 06/07 accord v6 trans (non hybrid). Car-part would be a good place to start. I see ones on there with decent mileage (under 80k miles) for around $800. Where are you located? If you are anywhere near NJ, have Paul in Clifton swap it out. Or see if the shop it is at will do the swap.
My 02 Tls drives amazing now with the accord trans. It feels more powerful, more responsive.

Evilocity

My acura TL is 2005, don't believe they can take Accord transmission like the older generation TLs can. Plus I already gave mechanic to start the job this morning : (

MarcDavidoff

The accord trans will work in your TL. There is a thread here where someone had done it..don't believe the steps are much different. That's ok though I would think if you gave them the go ahead as Im guessing they may have only just begun to remove the one that is in there or at most have it out right now. Maybe you could tell them to stop and explain you don't want to rebuild the one that's in there- they are a flawed design. If they can remove, rebuild, and replace the one that's in there then they should be more than capable of just replacing the old with the AV6

Nostradamus

Tell Acura to replace the Entire Transmission at NO cost or you will Sue them in court for this known trans problem

Happyjack

My 06 tl first filter change 209k acura told me there was no filter so for the last 20k miles i have been changing filters and oil since, along with solenoids, and sensors and pressure switches. i have the 2nd to 3rd shifting blues, can d o it while running manaully or jumping on it from get go and letting off at 4k or so and it shifts into 3rd fine and wont slip, couild this be the input shaft speed sensor???

Happyjack

Not much for blogging tweet or any of the social media, but wanted to Thank evryone who has posted information over the last 3 yrs You have saved me a couple thousand min for instance the CD player in the trunk the navi control box sent it to california got one back 4 days costs 500 acura 3000
savings 2500 thanks and the list goes on and on THANKS

Happyjack

Not much for blogging tweet or any of the social media, but wanted to Thank evryone who has posted information over the last 3 yrs You have saved me a couple thousand min for instance the CD player in the trunk the navi control box sent it to california got one back 4 days costs 500 acura 3000
savings 2500 thanks and the list goes on and on THANKS