A happy transmission story

[dieselgus]

So long story short, when I was moving here from Manitoba 4 years ago I used the Accord to pull a Uhaul trailer. Kinda pushing the limits (it was the 5x8. Loaded right up. Not the easiest pull for a 20+ year old car), but the old gal did it. Coming out of Kamloops (anyone familiar with highway 5 out of there knows it is a bastard of a long hill) on a 30+ degree C day I figured I smoked it. Slipping like crazy, smoking, the works. But, it made it here. And has been daily driven since then, to the tune of 80,000km later. Shifted like complete shit since then (didn't shift the best to begin with), but I didn't feel like tossing in a new tranny as I knew I did bad things to it and it was on borrowed time. So today I figured it was slow at the shop, went down to NAPA, grabbed 6L of fluid, new shaft seals, and a pair of axles (passenger has also been getting sloppy lately. Should have changed it when I did the suspension last year).

Drained out what is possibly the blackest and worst smelling fluid I have ever pulled out of a transmission, filled, drained again, filled, put it together, adjusted the TV cable, tended to a choke issue, and went for a drive. Lo and behold, shifts like a dream, no hunting and pecking, no clunks, no shuddering at 40km/h. The old gal drives and shifts pretty sweet once again.

Figured I would put this up in light of all the transmission threads lately. Pretty solid gearbox on these cars.

[Dr_Snooz]

Yes! The AT on these is a remarkable piece of engineering. Glad to hear your driving happy again.

[A18A]

sweet, that's good to hear. I was just wondering how well a good condition auto gearbox in these cars would handle a load too. or how well it'd some good power from the motor

[dieselgus]

The old guy that had it before me used to tow his little 16 foot aluminum fishing boat all the time with no issues.

These are a pretty solid automatic though. If you are driving like a skillethead, neutral drops/trying to do burnouts/other acts of random stupidity, sure you are going to be roasting it out. But, for good general driving with mild abuse (towing, extended high speed through mountains, a lot of heavy stop and go), keep the fluid changed with the right stuff and if you really want to keep things happy, add an external cooler.

I used the Castrol import stuff. Meets the Honda spec, and the spec on Dexron II, which is the original OEM spec for the automatics. Not to bad at $5.80/L either.

[2drSE-i]

I'm glad to hear stories like this. For years, this board has complained about the "crappy auto's" that came in these cars. Sorry guys, but 250k on an auto trans is pretty damn good!

[dieselgus]

Yup. Only fear I have is that the new fluid will wash whatever is holding this thing together off the clutch plates lol. Time will tell. Will probably pick up 9L and do a complete proper flush as per manual when I do the timing belt this fall (have a leaking front main or cam seal. Could just pop the belt off and change the seals, but may as well do the belt, tensioner and water pump for how cheap parts are)

Car just clicked over 356,000km btw.

[DBMaster]

I got over 300,000 out of mine before having to replace it. I have no desire for a manual transmission and would have to say that this auto is quite durable.

[LJ1987LX-I]

Since I started driving 5-speeds I can't stand automatics.

[carotman]

They key to a healthy Auto trans is clean fluid!

[import racer]

Well mines got over 400 000km on it but it does shift weird sometimes.

[DBMaster]

I started changing my fluid when the car was at its first maintenance point. I started doing it every 15,000 miles back when Dexron II was the spec. I switched to Mobil 1 synthetic fluid (this was well before Honda Z1) and started changing it every 30,000 miles. I drive quite aggressively with a lot of downshifts happening. Maybe that's why I "only" got 305,000 miles out of the original.