Hi all, I have a 99 accord automatic with the 2.3l. It shifts fine first thru third gear, in fourth however the rpms jump and it will hit hard. sometimes in fifth as well. I was just curious what is the best route for a new trans on a low budget. I am pretty handy and think I could swap it myself if i purchase a cherrypicker. My questions are is it best to pull mine and have it rebuilt, or if it is not super complicated could i rebuild it myself? Or should i go yank one at the junkyard and take my chances putting it in? It seems rebuilt trans go for about $1000 and i dont really want to dump that kind of money into a 99 with 218000 miles. Does anyone know any good write ups on doing this or should i buy a haynes? any help is appreciated. Thanks

 

I am pretty good at turning wrenches but rebuilding a transmission is very hard and something I would not do.
Everything must be 100% perfect or it will not last long at all.
I do not know if you are aware but the 98-02 generation had a much higher than normal transmission failure rate.
So that means that the likely hood of a transmission from a junk yard also failing is pretty high.
My local Pick-and-pull sells auto transmissions for $85 so I guess I would keep buying them until I got one that lasted.

Also you do not need a cherry puller to change the transmission, it can be done from under the car.

 

Yes I read about the high failure rate on the 98-02 accords. Thanks for the input. Any idea about how long swapping the tranny could take?

 

No one really can answer that for you.
All depends on your skill set, experience, and tools.
I like to work at a slow pace with a lot of breaks.
I could do it in 2 days working about 3 hours per day.

I highly recommend you buy or borrow a trans jack.
While you can use a floor jack and (very important here) ratchet straps the auto weighs around 140 lbs and it falling, whether it lands on you or not, is going to be a problem.

If you have not done so already download the service manual as it has step by step directions on how to R&R the transmission.

 

ok thanks alot for the help.

 

You can check out car-part.com for transmissions from junkyards. You can sort by price or distance to see what one will run you.

The 98-02 had major problems with their ATs in the 4-cyl and especially the V6.

You may be able to use a 96/97 automatic transmission on your car. Crispin will disagree, but those transmissions were more reliable than the 98-02s.

You will want to search the web to see if this swap is possible or simple to do.

 

I wont disagree but I will say this, if what you are saying is true, how in the heck did the 6 gens even make it off the dealers lot with such a bad transmission???? LOL

 

Crispin, where can i download the service manual? I will prob just try to get a 98-02 trans just to keep it straightforward and take my chances i get a good one. Its a pain right now because this car is my only ride and i cant afford to have it down for long. Thanks

 

Service Manual - There is a link in the "Common DIY Threads" sticky at the top that you can try......for the money, automanualsource and ~$27 for a cd shipped, ~$22 for just a download (be sure to have a good internet connection - 140MB) is prob the best place.

 

here is a link for your generation. http://downloads.hondatech.info/Auto...-00_CD_ISO.zip
It is an ISO so you will need to burn it to a cd if you cannot mount it.
If you do not know what mount it means then just burn it to a cd rom

Also if PA Honda says a 96/97 would work I would go for that one for the following reasons.

1) there were less problems for those years
2) being that your generation has so many bad ones the used market for those is most likely more active and thus more expensive.
3) if PA Honda says it will work then I believe it will work, he def knows what he is talking about.