Ask politely but firmly for Honda to replace the transmission.

Tell your story over at http://www.odyclub.com and see what you get.  If
you have a good dealer who will go to bat for you, at the VERY least
Honda will give you the transmission if you pay for the labor.  But that
should be your LAST concession; what you want is for Honda to step up to
the plate and give you a new tranmission, all up all out.

They did extend the warranty for those transmissions officially, to 7
years/100K miles.  So you're beyond that--but Honda has had SERIOUS
transmission troubles of late, and the last thing they need is a slew of
people like you with problems.

If your dealer is any good, you will get a new transmission for the
asking.

If he's not any good, you need to call American Honda's customer service
line (see odyclub.com for the number) and open a case with them on this.

Thanks to both of you gentlemen. I will contact my dealer today and ask them
to rectify this problem as nicely as I can. I have had ALL of my
maintenance, even simple oil changes, done through the dealer and they have
a complete record of everything done to this vehicle, including the problems
we had with the power doors early on. They replaced the control modules on
both doors when we had about 40K miles on it and were out of the warranty
and they swallowed the $700 cost for that. So hopefully they will do the
same with this tranny problem.

I checked the odyclub site and was impressed with the organization and
content of the site so I joined. I will continue to peruse their postings.

Again, I thank you both for your input.

Michael

Well, I took your advice and visited the OdyClub site and, after reading
about the numerous problems involving Honda and their transmissions, I
printed out a list of the TSBs issued concerning the problems and made an
appointment with the Service Manager at my local Honda dealer. I went into
his office and calmly and clearly explained what was going on and how we had
had all of our maintenance done on time and by their mechanics. I also went
on to explain all that I had discovered about transmission problems through
the OdyClub web site and then I politely asked them to go to bat for me and
contact Honda and ask what they would do about this problem. He took my info
and promised to call me back the next day.

Next day comes, I get a call from the Service Manager explaining that he had
talked to Honda and explained the situation to them. After checking
everything out, they agreed to replace it with a new transmission if we
would agree to pay the labor costs. When asked how much that would be, they
replied, "About $575.00 - $600.00." I agreed to pay this since it was a lot
better than the $4,000.00 they wanted to charge me for a rebuilt
transmission in the first place.

He then told me that he would call me when the transmission arrived and we
would schedule a date to do the work. He ordered the tranny last Thursday
afternoon.

He called me Friday morning to say that the tranny was already there so we
scheduled the work for Monday (tomorrow morning).

Now, although I am hesitant to agree to the labor charges since some people
report not having to pay them, I would rather pay a small portion of the
costs since it does have so many miles on it, rather than waste time hashing
it out with the dealer and the manufacturer. I must admit that I am both
pleased and suspicious of the dealer. Pleased with their quick response and
suspicious in that they acted like they had never heard of a transmission
problem with my particular vehicle and in the way they were able to get a
tranny so quickly.

If anyone can offer a way to verify that Honda has replaced these
transmissions at no cost to the customer, please let me know as I'll gladly
bring this issue up to them tomorrow morning. Otherwise, I'll just have to
swallow it and pay them for their labor. In any case, I'm going to have a
new transmission and get my much-needed vehicle running again.

M