George writes:
Sajeev, the automatic transmission in my 1999 Honda Accord Coupe from a prior Piston Slap failed at 115k miles. Lost 4th gear (and reverse) on US-75 on Friday. Lower 3 forward gears work, but got a rental Saturday and kept the Accord parked at home. Have an estimate of $1850 from Plano Transmission to rebuild it with (tougher?) Raybestos clutches. Owner Jeff McLeod claims to have bought a 98 Accord from a customer, rebuilt the transmission, and drove the car to 200k miles. What is your opinion of rebuilding that transmission in a local shop vs. installing a factory rebuilt transmission? I like the idea of knowing exactly what was done to the transmission and where the core came from. What parts would you want inside the transmission if it was your car? My goal would be a
- A car capable of running to 200k miles
- A car reliable enough for getting to work and weekend trips for at least 2 years to 140k miles.
I test drove several cars this weekend and wasn’t excited with my replacement choices.
Sajeev Answers:
I’ve had good luck with a smart local shop upgrading my Ford transmissions, but I’m lucky. Look at the condition of the shop: how clean are the floors, how organized are the parts and workbenches seem, etc. Get a list of the upgraded parts that are supposed to fix the failed parts. Then look on the Internet to see what parts normally fail on these transmissions.
I am saying this because upgraded parts are sometimes overkill, and sometimes do more harm than good. Take, for example, the hi-po rebuild kits sold to those wanting a hot Ford AOD: the kevlar overdrive “band” supposedly builds more heat and stress than stock, not suited for 100% street use on cars with close to stock HP levels.
Your shop has a nice website and they seem to give you the right information, I’m inclined to believe they can fix it. I hope they recommend you get an external transmission cooler and run it in series with the factory cooler in the radiator, too.
George Answers:
Thanks for the reply. The shop appeared to be clean and well organized. At this point they plan to rebuild with stock parts except that they think Raybestos clutches last longer than the OEM ones. From conversation with the shop owner and work in progress they appear to work on a lot of Honda/Acura and Ford automatics. Honda cars and Ford trucks are very popular in the Richardson/Plano Telecom Corridor area.
My transmission failure is almost certainly due to operator error. The car stalled on the highway due to a worn ignition switch which I should have had replaced under recall years earlier. I attempted to shift to neutral to coast off the highway and somehow shifted into reverse. This caused a metal fork associated with reverse and 4th to get broken off. First 3 gears work without slipping and probably would have continued to work for many months if I had been more careful as I tried to get off the highway.
I’m having more empathy for people who experienced unintended acceleration. People make dumb mistakes when they experience sudden information overload.
Sajeev Replies (again):
Your last sentence is a universal truth, a fact we should take to heart. Owning up to your mistakes (at least to yourself) is a smart move. Doing so in regards to a Honda, a somewhat-disposable vehicle, is downright honorable. Luckily for you, I believe your attention to detail with the tranny rebuilder and love of the Accord Coupe shall keep you motoring for well beyond 200,000 miles. If you so choose.
That’s because your Accord coupe is a beautifully restrained sweetheart, inside and out. And unless the next generation Accord goes on a serious diet, I suspect you’ll happy fork over $2000-ish for a local mechanic to put in a LKQ-junkyard motor when your V6 starts losing compression, when your coupe is in dire need of a heart transplant. I have high hopes, so don’t be surprised if this car lives as long as you see fit.
Send your queries to mehta@ttac.com
Agreed. If not for my dumbass mistake in the snow, my 2001 Accord EX 4-cylinder would still be motoring happily along. I had to let it go at 222000 miles.
If you can find a good reputable shop, go for it. I got turned on to a good local shop by my trusted mechanic who didn’t do transmission work. It was a for a 97 Escort, the automatic died from my poor maintenance. The two grand I dropped on a rebuild was still cheaper than new car payments.
I’m facing a similar quandary being the proud owner of an AODE that’s getting ready to grenade. I want to replace it with a factory reman’d 4R70W but I also know a shop that checks all the boxes Sajeev lists. Hmmm.
Ha-
This is all very timely. My ’96 manual Accord (non-coupe four-banger) just gave up the transmission ghost at 215k last month.
Got a great estimate at a significantly lower cost to repair it, but it would have been exorcised from another vintage Accord with it’s own odometer issues. I trust the shop, the guy was pretty frank. Could have gone either way, but dropping 4-figures and driving off with a car that still had the mileage didn’t quite feel right.
I, too, was not pleased with the Honda lot. J.C. what crap they’re slinging these days. When I pass a Crosstour, I feel insulted, personally. I cured my new vehicle apprehension with a mk6 GTI. Coming from the Honda family, I went ahead and got the extended warranty.
sajeev, very interested in your comment about having an external transmission line cooler as well as the standard run through the radiator. My automatic trany ’98 Civic has done just fine for over 235,000 miles without any modification but my ’74 Peugeot 504 with a fragile ZF3 automatic tranny is getting a new radiator and i suppose I could get an external line cooler put in as well. This would be the time to do it but is it really going to make a difference?
It really depends on where you drive. Tranny coolers aren’t free, but they are invaluable to someone wanting to keep their car for 10+ years.
1. If you’re in a hot area, yes.
2. If you fight gridlock on a regular basis, yes.
3. If you carry a fair bit of cargo or tow anything, yes.
4. If you combine all of the above, most certainly yes.
I would also add:
5. If it’s a minivan, yes.
…though I suppose that adage might apply to any front-drive car at or over 4000lbs.
+ 1 on that.
I wish I had. My 1994 Tempo was completely reliable until, I moved from Michigan to Phoenix in 2008. One too many traffic jams on the freeway and the transmission failed.
cackalacka: tell us if you ever regret not putting a new tranny in the old Accord.
Will do sir; and I’m sure that day will come when I look at a German repair bill.
Although, adding to my decision were several radiator/cooling issues over the past few years, electrical problems over the past 18 months, a non-functional AC in the dirty south, and a clutch cylander that was replaced a month before the transmission went south. That, and the fact that I was driving a jallopy that I was not comfortable taking >100 miles from home over the last few. My coworkers and girlfriend’s parents were pleased that I surrendered my sentimentality. To be fair, ~12 worry-free years and ~200,000 worry-free miles. Not bad for an appliance.
It is currently sitting beside the carport. We’re going to strip out the starter, tires, and anything else of value and put them in my lil bro’s ’98 Accord over the coming weekends.
I guess that is a good question for y’all; any recommendations as we chop my beloved?
Plan for the future.
Go ahead and convert to a small-block chevy engine (SBC), 4L60E tranny, RWD and fabricate a driveshaft now.
Heck, everybody knows a SBC fits everything.
Oh no, sittin’ sideways LS-4 swap instead of that.
I know in the world of VW cars, the best response to a failed 01M 4-speed automatic transmission is to ditch the automatic and swap in a good old 5-speed row-it-yourself transmission. (The 01M is not produced any more. The jury is out on whether the later auto trannies are any better in the long term.)
You might try judging a rebuild transmission by its warranty.
I have a FORD van, and when the E4OD transmission failed, I was advised to buy a replacement from FORD because they offer a good warranty. I’m glad I did; the transmission I installed (in my driveway :-) failed within the warranty, and the local dealer replaced it for free. When the replacement transmission developed shifting problems, they diagnosed a loose electrical connection (their fault :-) and the diagnosis and fix were free. This third transmission has been otherwise trouble-free.
BTW, I was charged about $1900 (before tax) for a rebuilt E40D (uninstalled :-).
I’m currently replacing the engine in the same van (worn rings, 170K) with a FORD-supplied rebuilt engine, same guarantee. :-) (FORD charged me $2100 for the engine before tax.)
stuart
I went through several after-market starters on my ’94 Ranger, new and rebuilt, self installed, before finally having the Ford dealer put a Ford starter in it. No problems after that. Sometimes the “stealership” is worth going to.
I would give American Honda’s customer service a quick call. You might be able to get them to absorb some of the costs of a factory rebuilt transmission. In the past Honda has been very liberal with the warranties of their transmissions and are known to help their customers.
I doubt that Honda will step up and offer any help on an 11 year old car with in excess of 100k miles on it, especially since the owner admits that the failure was likely due to driver error.
my 88 528e has a whopping 128 hp and around 175 pound feet of torque. With its 3.46 diff, it is going 88 mph at 3k rpm. The shift points are set low for economy. It will get 30 mpg on the highway. Up shifting manually, it will hit 70 at 5k rpm and 105 in 3 @ 5k. The torque converter locks at 42 mph in Drive.which is around .75,IIRC. The 4hp22 is a very rugged tranny. Its counterpart in the 535i not so much.
The 4hp22 used in the 528e is all but identical to the one in the 535i. By ’88 they had most of the issues worked out, but I still would not call it exactly rugged. I had and loved an ’86 535i, but with a proper gearbox and 3 pedals. It would NOT do 30mpg on the highway. :-) The extra hp and torque of the 535i certainly did that ZF transmission no favors. I did have a 4hp22 in a Volvo 744 that went 400K, but that car had all of 114hp.
This problem was very common among 98-02 model year V6 Accord. That’s why Honda extended the warranty of the transmission to 100K miles. The same thing happened to my 2001 Accord v6 Coupe at 115K miles, but I lost both third and fourth instead. My Honda dealer put in a call to Honda to ask for goodwill replacement, as I was a long time multiple Honda / Acura owner. Honda gave me a rebuilt transmission for free, but I had to pay for labor at dealer for the installation. By the time the claim came through, I had already bought another car, so I sold my Accord to my friend and he paid for the dealer to install the transmission. That was in 2006, and as of earlier this year my / his Accord was still running.
It’s tough to let those cars go, isn’t it? I have a 2000 Accord Coupe closing on 160K miles. I’m also having trouble finding anything I like among recent model cars, even though I plan to keep the Accord for as long as I can. I’m mainly looking for another car as I miss driving a manual transmission. (I originally bought the Accord after severely breaking my left leg, but it’s turned out to be the overall best car I’ve owned.)
I’m the owner of this Accord Coupe. The transmission rebuild went fairly well, but the shift quality isn’t the same as it was for the original transmission. The transmission shop returned the car with Amsoil synthetic transmission fluid plus Lubegard Black friction modifiers. Their intent was good, but there was lots of shudder in some of the shifts and you could feel every time the torque converter lockup disengaged. The transmission shop flushed the transmission and replaced the fluid with Honda ATF-Z1 and most of the shudder is now gone. However, even with Honda fluid, the replacement torque converter and clutches feel a little different. In my opinion a rebuilt automatic transmission is not as good as a new one.
So why spend almost $2000 on a 11 year old Honda? As Steve Lang has reported, used car prices are very high right now and I didn’t find a better option in the used market. In addition, I know the history of my Honda since it had single digits on the odometer. I know that the automatic had not been driven to the failed clutches/burnt fluid stage so I figured rebuilding this broken transmission would give better results than rebuilding a more typical core.
A friend in Jack’s neighborhood of Ohio is also interested in buying my Honda Accord. It’s been kept in a garage and has never experienced road salt, but I didn’t feel right about selling a car with a ticking time bomb transmission to her or any other friend. However, after the rebuild I’m reasonably sure it would provide reliable transportation for many years. I can now ask for full retail price with a clear conscience.
I have heard that like Chrysler transmissions, Honda’s are very picky about the fluid you use. They don’t react well to other types. Many Chrysler tranny problems have been eliminated by flushing out the non Chrysler fluid and replacing it with factory spec ATF+3 or +4. I also heard this a long time ago but could not confirm it – both companies used the same outside engineering firm (consulting or actual engineering?) when they designed their transmissions and both have had problematic trannys because of it. But the story may be apocryphal. The requirement for the specific type of fluid however is not.
How could you shift into reverse with the engine stalled? Automatics select gears by supplying hydraulic pressure to the various clutches and bands. All modern automatics have a single pump driven from the engine. Engine stalled = no pump = no pressure = no shifting = default to neutral.
Re rebuilts being deficient, I think you just had bad luck. I rebuilt a slipping Ford C4 with a kit from J.C. Whitney and it ran like new afterwards. Replaced an early GM 700R4 that crapped out at 60K with a rebuilt from a local shop and it was better than new, running for another 135K until the vehicle was totalled.
I lost all electrical while rolling down the highway at about 60mph. Worn ignition switch failed and whole dash went dead in heavy but fast 5:30PM Friday traffic. Not sure how transmission failure occurred because I was focused on not getting into a high speed wreck. Texas drivers leaving work and starting the weekend are especially aggressive. After I got to the side of the road, I was able to restart the car, but discovered I only had the lower 3 gears. The transmission shop found that the metal rod that engages reverse had been broken into 5 pieces.
Regarding rebuilds feeling different than original, I think some of the replacement parts are different than the ones selected by engineers that designed the transmission. Could have paid a small fortune for parts from Honda to get parts that work better together, but then the cost would have been too high.
I’ve had to have two rebuilt transmissions put in cars last year–my Mazda Millenia and my Mercury Mountaineer. The shop (Cottman Transmissions) had more experience with Mountaineers/Explorers. The results show…the Mountaineer rebuild drives really well, basically like new, with very smooth, near imperceptible shifts. The Millenia 1-2 upshift specifically is still pretty harsh; certainly not what you would expect from a new transmission. I’ve put about 15k miles on both so far since the changes. The Mercury started flashing the O/D light about 3 months after the rebuild, I took it to Cottman and the shift solenoid had gone bad, they put a new one on under warranty. Keeping my fingers crossed that these rebuilds hold up a bit.
I actually have had too many problems with the Millenia and am now working to rid myself of it. In the past year, along with the two transmissions, I’ve had to do a new radiator and unscheduled timing belt & tensioner on the Millenia. It ain’t cheap…and my used car blues resulted in a) huge, frequent repair bills and b) no improvement in trust in the Millenia. So I bought a new Malibu just last night to replace it.
What’s your definition of disposable? – my ’92 accord went 250k before the transmission failed, which could have been mu fault for not keeping up on maintenance. I think it was a tranny seal, but I didn’t go through the full diagnosis since I wanted a newer car anyway. I should have forked over the money to repair it – I’ve been dicking around with less reliable replacements since.