91 NSX auto help

[91NSX01ESPRIT]

I'm new to these forums but I've owned my NSX since august 2010. It was such a reliable car for the first 12K miles until recently. Mine is a 4 speed automatic and it started flaring between shifts. It eventually stopped going in to 3rd gear all together and then 4th. My mechanic said the tranny is worn and the cheapest solution was to get another one. I found one on Ebay from a user "Medida", he has 100% positive feedback and sells a lot of NSX parts, the one he was selling was from a 93 with 42K on it. I purchased the tranny in December and had it installed in February. Worked great the first 500 miles then bam, stopped going in to 3rd and 4th gear. If I turn the engine off I might be able to get in in to 3rd or 4th for a split second before the cars shifts back to 2nd. When it is cold the car will stay in 3rd or fourth longer but will eventually go back to 2nd gear. I took it back to my mechanic and he says everything external of the transmission is good and that it might be another bad tranny. Grrr the back luck. Now I have two bad trannys and an NSX with only 2 gears! Should I have one of them repaired, look for another, or do a conversion to a manual? Any idea of cost comparisons on these? I also own a 2001 Lotus Esprit that I bought back in 07 which was been 100% reliable and I use as the daily driver that the NSX was suppose to be

 

[Meeyatch1]

The conversion to a 5-speed manual will be significantly more than you think. To do it correctly, and do the full conversion, you will have to not only get the normal parts like the transmission and clutch, but also all of the proper support parts. Clutch reservoir and parts, the engine computer, different cam shafts (yes, the manual has different cams), different center console dials (you will need an 8k RPM tach instead of the 7,500 RPM tach), and then also replace the dial that has the shift pattern on it with one that does not, and the list goes on and on.

Needless to say....re-building one of your two transmissions (I would rebuild the original so that the car has the matching numbers), is your best choice. Also, by doing a full re-build on your original, you will know everything is new. So if it breaks after 1,000 miles you can go back and kill the guy that did it and not have to pay again.

I hope this helps.

 

[91NSX01ESPRIT]

Thanks for the advice. I talked with another member from Prime on the phone earlier today. He recommended Rick from Acura of Seattle to repair the original tranny. My only concern would be the long term reliablity of this. I don't drive the car hard at all and when I bought the car originally from Park Place they did a tranny fuild change. Anyone know the general reliability of an auto nsx?

 

[Meeyatch1]

Thanks for the advice. I talked with another member from Prime on the phone earlier today. He recommended Rick from Acura of Seattle to repair the original tranny. My only concern would be the long term reliablity of this. I don't drive the car hard at all and when I bought the car originally from Park Place they did a tranny fuild change. Anyone know the general reliability of an auto nsx?

I forgot to mention that I previously had a 1991 NSX with an automatic transmission. When I sold the car after around 10 years and 132,000 miles, it still shifted perfectly without issues. This was even with some track events. Keep in mind, I had the transmission fluid changes every 7,500 miles to make sure it was always fresh.

 

[NSX2398]

Use the advanced search function to search by user name for 'mcano' who had his automatic fail after the track event at NSXPO in Oct 2010. He had some posts about replacement options.