I would like to know which Honda manual transmissions are compatible with the 2002-2004 J35A4. This will be used in a VW Vanagon.

 

I believe CL Type-S transmissions have the correct bolt pattern on the bellhousing.

 

Thank you for your help. I was mainly interested in the J35A4 because a stand-alone wiring harness is available. However, on thinking about this some more, there may be other J-series engines that would be suitable, the main issue would be the wiring. I would need to interface the Honda ECU and engine harness with the Vanagon wiring. I have done some research on the web but have found little technical information on how to build a stand-alone harness for J-series engines.

A second consideration is the choice of transmission. I wanted to use a manual transmission because I have seen numerous reports of the failure rate of the 2002-2004 automatic transmissions. Perhaps this is overblown. If I could get around the automatic transmission weaknesses, an auto would work for me. Any suggestions?

 

If I remember correctly from my searching back when I was helping a buddy prepare to do a j35 swap in a 7th gen accord, the only direct bolt on (to the earlier J35 engines) manual swap was the 6th(I don't remember if they offered these with a manual)-7th gen accord 6 speed, you can use the 07-08 TL type-s 6 speed, but you will need to do a bell housing swap. You should be able to use what toyomatt84 said as well, but I think those are pretty hard to come across compared to the Accord & TL-S 6 speed.

The autos aren't to bad, it just depends on which year/model you use. The newer (for example 04+ for the TL) autos are much better than the earlier models.