I just bought an 02 Accord with almost 234,000 miles. It shifts fine except between 1st and 2nd it seems to rev between the shifts. The shift is like the transmission is slipping and then bang it gets into 2nd.

People say changing transmission fluid is not a good idea if there is not a history of changes. No clue if this fluid has been changed. The previous owner said he added 1/2 qt once. What would you all suggest?

 

You could try cleaning the solenoids but I doubt it will do much. It's likely you bought a car with an already failing transmission. The 98-02 Accords are notorious for transmission failures. After doing numerous transmission replacements on these over the years for failures, my advice is now "drive it into the ground and then junk it." Even if you replace the failing transmission, it's not a matter of if it will happen again - it's a matter of when.

 

At this point, you can't really lose changing the fluid, it's not going to get better if you don't. try something like MaxLife fluid, it often helps if it's just fluid that needs changing.

The other thing you can do, which might seem a little crazy, is to drill a hole and clean the filter inside, it has helped a lot of people and has turned out to be a common cause for their supposed demise.
Read here about it and where to drill the hole to get to the filter.

https://honda-tech.com/forums/honda-.../#post52649066

If it is bad, it is much cheaper to simply pick up another transmission, swap your solenoids over, and put it back in. I swapped one in at about 170,000 miles on my mine, swapped solenoids, replaced the fluid, which I do about every year or 25,000 miles, and it's been 50,000 miles and still going strong.

 

Ok I just did a drain and fill. The transmission was definitely overfilled before. I drained over 2 quarts and filled maybe 1.8 checked when warmed up and it is at the correct level.

I used Valvoline ATF and put a full bottle of Lubegard Red in. Now I am mad I didn't get the Honda ATF fluid but really wanted to save money. My plan was to only do one drain and fill which is why I added the Lubegard this time.

The car drove super nice when cold. As everything warmed up it still had shifting problems from 1st to 2nd although not as bad as before. Of course this is after only a 10 mile drive so I can't tell for sure. Should I do a drain and fill a few more times with Honda ATF or continue with Valvoline? The old fluid was super dark. Even checking the dipstick after changing it looks cleaner now.