Between me and my partner, we are down to just one car, which is our 98 Accord EX V6. Aside from hating the slushbox 4spd tranny for efficiency reasons, it has a well known history of crapping out as most people here probably know. We bought the car at 205k, and it did have some shifting slight shifting issues, but at $800 it was a steal so we went ahead and bought it.
Shift to present day
The car now has 226k miles on it, and it doesn't appear to worse than when we got it. The only trans issue that I have found is that it revs up too high when shifting between 2nd and 3rd gear, and when it does shift there is a slight "clunk". Like I said, it is a slight clunk. Through EcoDriving and playing around with the throttle near the shift points, I can easily mitigate the high revs, and the clunking noise is significantly reduced. Conversely, giving the car enough throttle to induce a downshift into 2nd gear causes a VERY noticeable "clunk" (Is this what is called slipping?).
I don't even qualify as shade tree mechanic, but I feel like I've ascertained enough off the Internet to assume that it is not a serious trans problem. I am thinking that the high revs is a torque converter issue, which I have read can "starve" the tranny fluid and eventually cause it to crap out. For that reason I have been stressing the ecodriving to my partner, which he has shockingly embraced. We had a transmission service done on it, but tbh I have no idea what was actually done. First thing I want to do when I get money is have the trans fluid flushed 3X and see if that helps.
What do ya'll think? Should I be expecting a complete transmission failure soon? How much (time/money) would be involved in getting the torque converter replaced?
Edit: Other pertinent info perhaps - the car was so cheap because it wouldn't pass inspection due to the Catalytic converter. We never replaced the cat converter, just put in some additive that made the CEL go off long enough to pass inspection.
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