phillyphan

Hello everyone. Just bought a very well taken care of 2007 Honda Civic EX Coupe Automatic for my son that just got his permit today. I've noticed that the transmission seems to shift a little rough through most gears, so I was wondering if this was normal or do I have an issue. The lady I bought the car from was the original owner and kept records of all the maintenance she had done. The car has 142k miles on it right now and I noticed she had the transmission fluid replaced along with the 3rd clutch pressure switch at 107k miles. I was thinking I needed to change the transmission fluid until I saw she had that done almost 35k miles ago. I checked the transmission fluid and it's sitting right in the middle of the high and low on the dip stick after running the car for about 10 minutes. Is this shifting just normal for the Honda Civic? Any help would be very appreciated, thanks.

DJFCivic

What was transmission fluid used for the recent change? Although the Owner's manual indicates that transmission fluids other than "genuine Honda" fluid can be used, I've read in several forums that shift quality can be severely impacted if different fluids are used (e.g. Dexron). Assuming the are no underlying transmission issues (seems low enough in milage) I would recommend replacing it with either genuine Honda fluid (only slightly more expensive if you shop around) , or at the very least fluid that is explicitly specified for Honda. Note that a typical change is only 3 quarts due to the transmission design (no removable pan), as such, this method really only dilutes the fluid since the is about 10 quarts total, so you would have to repeat this service a few times. An option is to perform a "full flush" which normally requires a machine that gets connected into the cooling lines and collects the old fluid while. However some manufacturers discourage this method (I don't know why).

You will have to do a little research into what was done / where it was done to determine if it's just the wrong fluid or if there is a deeper problem. Good luck!

phillyphan

Thanks for the response. A few weeks ago I flushed the transmission fluid with the Honda specific fluid. Still have the harsh shifting from 1st to 2nd. The previous owner had all her maintenance done at the Honda dealership and I have all the records showing the services performed. I keep reading about the linear solenoid valve being an issue on earlier models, but nothing about this model. It does seem to improve a little after it runs for a while. I just want to make sure I'm not causing more damage by not repairing something small that could be causing this harsh shifting like a solenoid.

As you can see there's not much help in this forum. It took over a month to get a response. So good luck if you ever need help with anything.