Finally after almost 3 months of waiting since I ordered it, our BWP/Espresso SH-AWD has been delivered to the dealership. Tomorrow I go sign the papers and then the options will be installed:

• Body Side Molding
• LED Fog Lights
• 19-in Diamond-Cut Alloy Wheels
• Protection Package II
• Decklid Spoiler
• Door Edge Film

For the tires, I am having them put on Michelin Pilot Sport A/S 3 V-Rated tires in the 245/40 R19 size.

I think personally I would have gone for either the BCP or the GLM, but my wife has wanted a white car ever since we bought our first car together, which ended up being black (as did the next one, and then the CBP TL Type S). She did almost second guess herself when she saw the GLM, but she stuck with the white. :-)

 

Great! congrats. post some pics

 

Will do, absolutely. Glad you reminded me LOL!

 

Congratulations! It's nice to finally get in the car and drive it off the lot as yours. After all the anticipation, your day has finally arrived. Enjoy.

 

Congrats! Great combo. I am so jealous

 

Congrats on the new TLX. Please be aware of the deck lid spoiler fitment issues.

 

Stew...*lol* When I read the first line of the thread, my first thought was "oh my, Stew is going to be jealous", then I read your post....(LOL).

Hang in there....your day will come and will make the wait that much more worth it.

 

I signed the paperwork today, got 1500 off msrp, 500 off options plus no installation cost for any of it. I also got an extended warranty. I thought a lot about it and given the new transmission and sh-awd mechanism I thought it might be prudent. I had one on my 2000 Accord EX coupe and that paid for itself many times over with the transmission problems I had with that car. I also got Celijet so we shall see how well that works.

 

Mine is "supposed" to be built this Tuesday.. we shall see

Congrats again, 9speed, sounds like you made a good deal!

 

I feel pretty good about it. I didn't get the trade-in I thought I would on the TL Type S, because of the mileage, but at least the dealer matched what CarMax offered. And of course the 6% sales tax was something I had forgotten about But I do feel like I got a good deal, they discounted both the warranty and the Cilajet as well. The biggest expense was the wheels and tires, but I accept that as the price to have the car handle the way I want it to.

I know the waiting is tough, hopefully they can get it to you within a week or so. Supposedly it only takes 2 shifts to build one.

 

Anxious to see shots of it!

 

I am picking it up this evening, so hopefully I will have decent shots up by this weekend! :-)

 

I really look forward to seeing your pictures. .. I will most likely drool a bit... just ignore that

 

...our ability to ignore it will all depend on where you are drooling from

 

I said drool, not ooze... ewww

 

^^ LMAO!! I'll play the "I am French" card Je ne comprend pas *lol*

 

 

^^^^

????

 

So the dealer accidentally forgot to install the body side molding, and I was debating about having them do it or not since the Cilajet had been applied and would need to be removed and reapplied where the molding goes. I was looking over the car in the lot under one of the lights (it was dark out already) and noticed a blemish in the BWP paint right behind the right rear passenger window just above door handle level. The service manager felt that was a flaw in the Cilajet application, so I said go ahead and put the molding on while you fix this blemish AND ANY OTHERS YOU HAPPEN TO FIND. I also instructed the sales guy I have been working with that I wanted the car kept in the shop until I got there this afternoon so I could inspect it carefully before accepting it.

On the other hand, the 19" diamond cut wheels look freaking awesome, even the sales guy was raving about how great they looked and how much Acura needed to up its game with its standard wheels.

So MAYBE TODAY I will pick up the freaking car. But it does look great and the BWP really is beautiful in the light, artificial or otherwise.

 

I haven't seen the diamond cut wheels in person but my parents saw them at their dealership and said they looked "stunning" on the car.

 

They are great looking rims. I've not seen them on a BWP yet but have on a couple of black cars at the dealership. I am considering them too.

 

Stew4HD...I saw them on an I4 in White with teh bodykit and it was stunning!! They look amazing and make the TLX so sharp!!

If you can afford them, you will not regret it....

 

If I get them, it'll be through the parts department where they are cheaper, according to the parts manager here.

 

But then you have to get the tires, which is another $1K US even through Tire Rack for the A/S3s... But again, well worth it. I told my salesman I wasn't even going to drive the car out of the dealership on the OEM tires. ;-)

 

I am going to try on the set of 19" HFP diamond cut wheels/tires I took off my Accord first

 

WOO HOO Picked it up tonight, went over the paint with a fine tooth comb and it was perfect, and the Cilajet makes the finish really slick, stuff just slides off of it.

I drove it home about 4 miles in the rain. Car handles like a dream and rides like a limo, and of course the nice wide AS/3s grip like you are on rails even on wet roads. A bit noisier perhaps than with the standard tires but still like a vault compared to the TL Type S.

Did not notice any rocking at stops or when I parked the car (I DID notice the rocking with the MDX when I put it into park and took my foot off the brake without the parking brake -- boing!)

Checked out the bass in the stereo and it seemed fine. Of course I didn't get it up to highway speeds yet so we shall see.

My son was amazed when the auto idle stop kicked in. It was so subtle you had to really be looking for it but I am proud to say he is as disturbingly attentive to things like that as I am LOL.

This vehicle seems like everything I hoped it would be, but time will tell. ;-) I will post pics this weekend when the sun comes out. :-)

 

^^ Congrats and DELIGHTED to see you are enjoying your purchase!! Nothing worse than getting a car and then having buyer's remorse.

I can't wait to see the pics....

 

Congrats 9SpeedTran!! Wishing you many happy motoring miles with your new TLX. Enjoy it.

 

Congrats 9Speed. Don't go looking for problems or defects. If they arise you will know, and then get it dealt with.

 

Looking forward to seeing the pics. After 3500 miles I am still glad I purchased the TLX.

It's a joy to drive everyday, rain or shine.

 

9SpeedTran: The AS3's are noisy in the first 300-500 miles. I noticed that on my 4G TL, after that they get more quiet. Not sure why they got more quiet. But after 2000 miles I am impressed. Not only they grip like hell but I didn't have to go back to re-balance them as I did twice with the Primacy MXM4.

One thing you'll notice, if you had other Michelin tires in the past, is the TPMS will go from 220kpa to 250kpa really fast on the freeway. So, don't over-inflate them. Dead cold they should be at 220 kpa or 32psi. If you over-inflate them and they hit 300 kpa / 44 psi... it may be bad news.

 

Lots of luck! Sounds like a beauty!

 

Thanks Tonyware! I have had the AS/3s for over a year on my TL Type S, and I keep them at 34 psi cold in the front, 32 rear... I used to run the AS+ much higher because they had softer sidewalls but never let them get above 40 psi when hot. I wish more places offered nitrogen, it would be easier to keep the pressure constant as the temperature fluctuates wildly. :-)

 

A correction coming from an ex-autocrosser/tracker who's played around a lot with pressures. Cold pressures within the normal range (up to maybe 45 psi, even in a 120* desert) will be fine hot at street driving temps, so the 40 psi limit doesn't apply. If you were to let air out to reduce it to that, you'd possibly get underinflation overnight, or at least misadjusted pressure. That's why it's never recommended to adjust hot tires (outside of racing).

The temp rise from highway use is factored into the tire construction and unless the tire was way overinflated say twice normal there's no immediate concern. Those donut spares are spec'ed to 60 psi cold.

Nitrogen doesn't keep pressure constant, all gases inert or mixed expand at the same rate due to temp rise. Nitrogen is used because it's clean (water vapor free) and therefore has an even temp / pressure rise which is the benefit compared to pump air from coin-op hoses or unfiltered tank compressors. The volume change of a drop of water to vapor when heated is tremendous and is what throws pressures off. It's only nitrogen because N2 is the most common element (in more ways than one) of air and its molecules don't rapidly seep through rubber, unlike Helium.

 

Well I'll be damned. Ya learn something new every day, as they say! :-) Thanks!!!

 

Another thing, ride and handling are engineered for the stock pressure (32/35/whatever) as pressure plays a part in tunng everything else suspension related. More than +/- 2 psi and you start to notice - lower has a softer ride but squishier handling; higher a firmer ride and sharper handling, to a point.

Contact patch is dependent upon pressure also, its size varies based on vehicle weight and g force. Lower pressure enlarges it giving some braking / accel traction advantage (e.g. drag starts), higher keeps the tire from rolling over onto the sidewall and losing tread contact during hard cornering for better handling along with an mpg increase. The majority benefit off stock for most performance driving is to go a few psi higher, esp. for autocross/track use.

A trick many street drivers / cars use for the track is to start at a lower psi and let the tire squishiness build up heat after a few laps which raises psi to the desired level while also increasing tire stickiness, esp. for R compounds. A higher cold psi will rise slower and leave the tire cooler. The target pressure is where the tire doesn't roll over much but isn't balled out like a balloon. You don't have to think about all this if you have an F1 pit crew to do it for you.

 

Drove it a good 30 miles, almost all on the highway, almost all at 70-80mph. Showed 33 mpg. The only way I could tell the VCM kicked in was when the mpg monitor went to 60 for extended periods on a flat road with gentle, constant throttle pressure -- no shaking.

Handling is even better than the TL Type S because of the SH-AWD, much less understeer than the old car, but feels just as responsive, not vague at all. I think that vagueness people report is almost entirely the squishy OE tires. Suspension is much more sophisticated, taut when it needs to be but not nearly as bone jarring as the Type S.

Very quiet but tire noise was noticeable. Hard to tell whether it was the tire noise or the ANC but it wasn't until I bumped the volume up above 20 that I could hear clean bass. (My normal listening volume when alone in the car for my MP3 player via AUX input is 30, but my wife was snoozing in the passenger seat this morning LOL.)

I think I am already loving this car LOL...

 

At the dealer, before options.




At home, with options




19" Diamond Cut Wheel up close, although the picture does not do it justice.

 

^^ I agree...the middle pic looks STUNNING but as you said, they look so much better in person!

Congrats and thanks for posting....Damn Acura and its tranny problems is keeping me from getting my own. I know I should worry about what I read and get what I want but I'll be kicking myself if I do get it and have problems after reading so many problems here.

 

So Weather, here's what I have noticed about that so far. In Sport mode, it seems like the shift points for 1 and 2 are very low, around 3K rpm or lower, and then it starts to either hold them longer or the range of the gears is wider, but you stop noticing it. I imagine all this would disappear with Sport+ which I haven't tried yet. So it really is optimized even in Sport mode for a more gentle (read fuel efficient) takeoff.

Also, I had a CD (BT's Emotional Technology, one of my wife's faves I was recording to the HDD) cranked up to 18 and there is no problem with bass. HOWEVER, the seats have some sort of strange padding in them that absorbs the vibrations so you don't feel the thump in your tail the way one typically does. It was really surprising -- also the car itself doesn't seem to vibrate much either. We'll see how that lasts after a couple years of thump. ;-)