Ok. I have a 1992 Hatch that i'm wanting to take off the road and go through and probably do a turbo build. In the mean time i'm looking for a fairly nice daily driver. I have came across a base 5th Gen Prelude that is very clean and has all options except leather seats which is fine with me anyway.

I'll cut to the chase... A friend of mine and his brother both owned separate 1998 Preludes and both experienced weird electrical issues such as the car cutting off (predominantly after 100k miles) and stuff while it was driving as well as engine misfiring and other such issues. I found a 1998 with 80k miles locally that is pristine for $8800 it seems like a good deal but it has the tiptronic transmission with auto and that is the same transmission that the two 1998s had.

My Questions:

Are there any weird electrical issues with 5th gen autos?

Is there anythign I might need to research before I buy this car. It is very nice and I'm extremely interested in getting it.

Sorry guys... I don't know much about preludes

 

the 5th gens have an ignition switch recall. thats what causes the car to shut of while youre driving. as for the random missfires...they could be related to several things like EGR clog, plugs, rotor...etc

as for the triptrnoic tranny...they are famous for failing and theres nothing you can do. your best bet is to get a manual or convert it.

 

thanks. I had read that. the weird thing is when it started misfiring he replaced his coils plugs wires rotor and cap as well as some other relays and such and it still did it. His car had been wrecked--not sure about his brothers, but his car had been hacked up pretty good and was sort of cobbled together. Who knows maybe they both got a hold of a bad one.

As for the conversion is it a simple matter of swapping out parts or does custom brackets and other odd things become an issue when converting it. I have done a few tranny swaps for civics and I know you have to put a new bracket on the transmission and stuff...

 

if youve done it on civics then you know pretty much what is involved in it. the ecus are different so youll have to either get a new one and have the immobilizer redone at your local honda dealership or convert the auto ecu.