Rep Power: 194

Today when I was driving home (from the Honda dealership ironically) my 2004 civic's auto transmission started to slip. It only happens at stop lights i.e the car has been in drive but stopped for a period longer than 30 seconds. When I try to accelerate from a stop light the revs jump to around 3-4000k and then the tranny slowly starts to engage but after that it will drive perfectly until I stop for longer than 30ish seconds again. What do you think is wrong?

I've got a vid on my phone that I'll try and upload after school tommorow

Also if it turns out the entire tranny is bad and needs to be replaced, what would be the cost of swapping in the manual tranny with all the necessary components vs the cost of a replacement auto tranny?

Any and all help is appreciated, thank you!

Btw my car only has 85,000 miles on it

 
Rep Power: 194

Here is the video- http://youtu.be/rMAZRmN_BBI

 
Rep Power: 519

What work did you have done there?

Why didn't you go right back there as soon as you knew something wasn't right?


Check the trans fluid. Is it low? (You DO know how to check it, right?)

 
Rep Power: 194

I was going up there to order a few miscellaneous interior pieces, there was no work done. I did bring it back up there after it started slipping, that's where it is now. I'm still waiting on a diagnosis from them.

I checked the Trans fluid before i brought it up, it was full and clean (just replaced around 6k ago).

My main question now is how much extra would it cost to have the manual and all misc. components swapped in vs the cost of the auto?

 
Rep Power: 519

Ok, I get it now. I thought you had it in their shop.

Needs a trans (overhaul or replace), for around (SWAG) $3G.
No clue about a swap here, I only deal with stock.

 
Rep Power: 194

Ouch, ill have to explore my options here. I'll write back with what ends up happening. Thank you for your response!

 
Rep Power: 194

Update: It came out that the whole transmission needed to be replaced, the dealership wants $2400 for everything. What do y'all think about that price?

 
Rep Power: 519

Cheaper than my guess.

Is it gonna be a factory (Honda) reman, or someone elses reman (Jasper, H&A, etc.)?
Check into the warranty.

 
Rep Power: 194

It would be a Honda tranny with a 3 year 36,000 mile warranty

 
Rep Power: 0

I had the exactly the same problem on my 01 civic months ago. I did all the research but I ended up bringing my car to AAMCO. Well, I had a few problems with them at first but I paid $3k for them to rebuild my transmission with a lifetime warranty. I thought it's better than getting a transmission from the dealership with 3yr warranty especially if you plan to keep the car longer than 3 yrears. At least it will save you a fortune just in case the tranny fails again in the future. My advice is for you to find a shop that offers a lifetime warranty. You don't have to go to AAMCO as long as you can find a shop that offers longer warranty. Good luck.

 
Rep Power: 194

I don't plan on keeping it long enough for it to fail again, so I went with the honda reman and i should have the car back Tuesday. Im working with Honda to negotiate the price more (they wanted 4k originally) since it failed so insanely early, ill let everyone know what happens. Thanks ezone and traveler for the input!

 
Rep Power: 194

Final update: The entire transmission was replaced for $2400 with a reman Honda tranny. I had it for about 10 minutes before i realized something wasn't right. Brought it back in and they found the range switch was acting up, they replaced it and now everything's running great.

 
Rep Power: 0

I wonder what caused it to slip from 1st gear, not very common. Did the problem start all of a sudden all at once or just every now and then?

And what do you mean by range switch?

 
Rep Power: 519

The range switch would cause that. The computer had NO CLUE what gear was selected, so it defaults to like 3rd gear or something.

The range switch is what makes those PRNDL lights on the dash light up.

HTH

 
Rep Power: 0

So the range switch is outside of the trans? So maybe the clutch packs in the trans were still good, but just the range switch was telling different?

 
Rep Power: 519

Yes.
There's no maybe.
Some of these transmissions can't do a damned thing if the computer doesn't tell it what to do.

 
Rep Power: 222

The torque converter clutch failed.
I had the same experience a few months ago.