Mr. Koichi Amemiya
American Honda Motor Co.
1919 Torrance Blvd.
Torrance, CA 90501

Wont do any good tho. American Honda tries to spend the least amount of money possible on these kinds of things, so if your experience is anything like mine has been, you'll get the ol' "so sue me." Well, I did. I'll let you all know when I get it resolved.

 

Good luck with getting Honda to warranty the tranny. I've been reading a lot about rannies and differentials going bad. What is going on with this car???


Rev - let us know how the lawsuit turns out. Maybe if we have enough bad trannies, we can turn it into a class action suit.

 

Well, I'm disappointed.

The excuse for not covering the damage was "the syncro rings seem to be damaged due to driver error/abuse" and that they were the initial cause of TOTAL transmission failure.

I ask them to rethink their position with this in mind: What do you think happens to syncro rings when you have
to drive a seized transmission?! I maintain my belief that they were damaged AFTER the original failure.

I suspect that an end bearing may have been installed backwards during a rebuild, they are angular bearings and only go one way. I am on my way to Austin TX next weekend with the almighty S2000 tow vehicle to pick up my car and tranny, I will bring it all back and after I look over it, hope to have a private party investigate the cause.

Their second excuse would have been a recently installed ACT PP and Toda FW.

I say excuses because I feel who ever was sent to inspect the tranny, did so from a biased standpoint
and from the beginning was looking for anything to discredit my integrity as a driver/owner in order to
avoid the expense. Further I am disappointed that this all took TWO WEEKS, the first for the service
department to complete a teardown.

And now they tell me there isn't a new transmission available in the USA? How many cars have been sold here? Would it not be smart to stock a few parts here in this country? The person on the other end of the
phone line seemed perplexed when I mentioned I already have a replacement - I did not wait for them and
got lucky at the same time.

When a mechanical problem occurs at my shop, time is critical - if needed I can get a part shipped from
Germany over night- I have a tech line I can call 24-7 and even get a mechanic within 24hrs if needed.
Service through that company is outstanding, they are Heidelberg, a printing industry leader.
I cant believe car manufacturers would be so shady and place such little emphasis on maintaining
customer relations.

 

top - feel my pain

 

So, since they are not going to warranty it, I take it you are going to fix it yourself, since you already have a replacement tranny. Are you still going to try to get Honda to pay for it???

 

YES

There is the new issue of a Honda recall, I have a copy of the official letter FROM HONDA

this affects early models and is specifically related to my problem, well see what they say now.

My S2000 was built in 8/99

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by cmnsnse
[B]YES

There is the new issue of a Honda recall, I have a copy of the official letter FROM HONDA

 

Last spring my transmission went. No previous grind - nuthin. I had the thing for three months. It took the dealership almost two weeks before I got it back. It was a miserable experience. Let's see, if you're paying $600 a month, then 10 days without your car is $200 - 200 bucks for my car to be in a garage, while it was 80 and sunny every day.

I called the dealership twice a day while they "ran tests" to see if it was actually a replacement tranny that it needed. Of course it was, which is what all the mechanics at the dealship told me, but there was procedure to follow. Sure, I'll be driving my rental Suzuki Vitara in 80 degree weather while you're following your *^#&$(@ procedure.

At one point, an American Honda rep (entirely separate from any dealership) said to my mechanic, "This is an example of driver error. This is a corners car, not a speed-off-the-line car. We've never seen anything like this before. We'll cover it this time, but if it ever happens again, you're on your own." Needless to say, I went apeshit. No one that can tell me it's the drivers fault that the transmission failed in a $33K sportscar, when it was 3 months old, FOR GOING TOO FAST. TOO FAST?! WHAT!?

I called American Honda customer service and complained about how I was treated. I wanted to know who was going to give me my $200 back that I was paying to have my car sit in a garage.

So, not only did they pay for the repair work, but they offered me a choice of warranty extensions: 1) 5 years on the tranny, or 2) 4 years on the whole car. I chose 4 yrs.

The car runs like brand new now.

My advice is to go down swingin'!

Here are some numbers:
American Honda
Direct - 800 999 1009
Warranty - 800 594 7400
Finance - 800 457 9299

I'll try to find the guy's name and extension who made it happen and repost. Good luck!

Trey

 

My condolences, and three words of advice A A A.
BTW - doesn't the standard warranty include raodside assistance, or is that only on the extended warranties?

 

Unfortunately the distances I travel and seem to get stuck (yes its happened to me twice before making this #3 )

The cheapest thing to do is get a Uhaul - I broke down BAD in Van Horn 8 years ago - that block was cracked and I had to take a bus to El Paso to get a Uhaul, to get back to Sierra Vista Az . . . when I got back to the car it had been trashed, and everything stolen out of it. I feel lucky that didn't happen this time.

AAA = 100 miles, hey I tried, it would have been way too much, but I just needed a ride. Closest help was at least an hour away.

Trey, Thanks for speaking up, I'm just a bit concerned about Honda doing the 'one time only' warranty - what about the lemon law? They better not dare claim again its my fault, or even mis-use, I had thought about tracking it after the warranty was up but never got to it EVER.

I've been busy preparing my truck/trailer to go pick the car up so I didn't get a chance to follow up today with the service department. I will call tomorrow from the road.

Eventually I hope to get some Vin numbers of tranny's affected - maybe even the extra one I picked up is a faulty one??

BTW the letter is basically a recall letter explaining there is a malfunction of the oil pump when in 6th gear at high speeds - (100+MPH) but then who's to say 99mph isn't affected?? The malfunction is it just doesn't pump enough oil at speed in 6th gear. The updated tranny's have this fixed (I assume)