So the day has come to let my 2005 TL go to a new owner with deeper pockets than mine. It made it to 302,000 miles and I had been changing the tranny fluid on schedule, but the old girl couldn't take it no more. It had 179,000 on the japan sent, dealership replaced tranny, and after changing the fluid Monday the14th, it crapped out. It began pumping fluid out the small vent tube near the starter. Filled it up and drove down the road and it was doing it again. Called a few trans shops and they all said the basic same thing,"rebuild time." One guy went so far as to say," if I drove it on vacation last week to FL," which was the main reason for the early fluid change in the first place," I would either end up on a wrecker or on fire!" Is fluid drain-back out of the torque converters on these that big of a problem? He seemed to think so and said he has seen a lot come in his shop that way. Both in Honda's and Acura's. His claim is the converters are pumping air and not fluid, for just enough time to push fluid out of the case. Then the more lost fluid space allows more air to fill the case and push out more fluid until there is none left and you start to slip.