CarComplaints.com Notes: The 1999-2003 Acura TL has a known & widespread defect with the transmission.
Honda fixed some vehicles with a recall in 2004 by changing the oil cooler return line. To settle a class action lawsuit in 2006, Honda extended the transmission warranty on some of these Acura TL's to 93 months / 109,000 miles.
Now these vehicles are past the warranty limit, so buyer beware.
10.0
really awful
Crashes / Fires:
3 / 0
Injuries / Deaths:
1 / 1
Average Mileage:
40,890 miles
About These NHTSA Complaints:
This data is from the NHTSA — the US gov't agency tasked with vehicle safety. Complaints are spread across multiple & redundant categories, & are not organized by problem.
So how do you find out what problems are occurring? For this NHTSA complaint data, the only way is to read through the comments below. Any duplicates or errors? It's not us.
I called Acura customer service to explain that my transmission was acting up, and they refused to replace it or even acknowledge a problem. The same was true of my local dealership, david mcdavid Acura of austin. Only when I was driving down the highway and my car downshifted from 3rd to 2nd gear, causing me to quickly decelerate, and causing the person behind me to almost hit me, did they replace the transmission. This was even after one tech at king Acura of birmingham felt the transmission problem.
With no prior warning, the automatic transmission suddenly and totally failed while traveling about 50 mph on Pennsylvania turnpike at 11:30 pm in snow on 11/26/02. Although on an incline, I was just able to get out of the line of traffic into the break down lane. Transmission would not engage in any gear total failure. Manufacturer replaced under warranty.
- Raynham, MA, USA
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Automatic transmission failure while vehicle under power. Transmission slips in 3rd gear and causes unexpected loss of forward motion. Transmission started to slip 10/05/2002. Continued to get worse until dealer determined replacement necessary on 11/01/2002.
Consumer has learned that these automobiles have a latent safety defect in the transmission that causes the vehicle to downshift while traveling. The dealer will not inspect the vehicle until a problem occurs. Jlg nlm
The transmission mis-shift several times from 3rd to 1st gear and was unable to shift from 1st to 2nd gear and 2nd to 3rd gear several times. The car was brought into the dealer first time on 8/19/2002 and the transmission was flushed 3 times. The problem was not corrected and I brought the car to the dealer second time on 8/28/2002. The dealer replaced the transmission. Even though, there is no accident in this incident. I am really concerning the safety issue caused by the transmission failure and I was not the only one having the transmission failure problem in this particular car model. I hope NHTSA can take appropriate action to investigate this problem before the fatal accident occurred because of transmission failure.
Transmission failed on major highway. Just learned that there have been over 16,000 such failures in the Acura and Honda using same transmission. Very dangerous and nearly hit the car in front of me.
I also got a rebuilt transmission that went out on me after another 2,000. This is extremely dangerous and I want Acura to do something. There is an article in the la times that speaks of this on 9.13.2002. Please help me, I'm worried I or someone else may get injured or killed. Nlm
I think they need to do a recall on this specific part because if it fails, it could cause major accidents and is totally unsafe for the owner and other drivers on the road: Article can be found on: www.latimes.com/classified/automotive/highway1/la-hy-acura11sep11.story?coll=la%2dclass%2dautos%2dhighway1. Nlm
I think they need to do a recall on this specific part because if it fails, it could cause major accidents and is totally unsafe for the owner and other drivers on the road: Article can be found on: www.latimes.com/classified/automotive/highway1/la-hy-acura11sep11.story?coll=la%2dclass%2dautos%2dhighway1
I think they need to do a recall on this specific part because if it fails, it could cause major accidents and is totally unsafe for the owner and other drivers on the road: Article can be found on: www.latimes.com/classified/automotive/highway1/la-hy-acura11sep11.story?coll=la%2dclass%2dautos%2dhighway1
A D V E R T I S E M E N T S
- Flushing, NY, USA