I have a 2007 Saturn Vue V6 AWD (has a Honda J35 motor and Honda transmission) that’s been shuddering quite a bit in 4th/5th gear, so I changed the fluid, tried lubegard shudderfix to no avail, and ended up taking it to a transmission shop to see how much a new torque converter would be. They told me the torque converter had metal on metal contact and sent metal bits and debris into my transmission, and that it would need to be replaced. Lowest price he gave me was $2300 to replace it with a used transmission with 88,000 miles. I called another shop and they quoted $2100 for a transmission with 118,000 miles. Both said that a re manufactured transmissions would be pushing $5000 because the solenoids in those Honda transmissions are pricey. Does this sound right? The cheapest shop offered a 12 month 12,000 mile warranty, is this an alright option or not worth it? I bought the car less than 6 months ago and it is in great condition otherwise so I’d like to keep it, but don’t want to dump money into it only for it to possibly happen again in the future.
I would shop around for other options. It looks like the list price on a factory rebuilt unit is around 2500 if I am looking at the correct part. You might try a GM dealer and see if they will give you a quote. I would also see if your area has a repair shop that specializes in Honda’s. The transmissions used with the V6 engine had a fairly high failure rate, they might be able to work some magic and rebuild/replace it for less than the transmission shop.
I’ll give that a shot, I have a couple of shops I’m going to call on Monday. I knew that older Honda transmissions were pretty weak, so it might be smart to get a used transmission with a warranty, and then try and sell the car before the year is up?
You will probably be fine with a low mileage used unit. I would just shop around to see if you can get a rebuilt/re-manufactured unit for a similar price. As a side note, do you know of the timing belt has been replaced? If not you may be looking at another expensive service item.
You can check here to get an idea of used prices. The top of this list also shows several reman units.
Reman units are available from most auto parts stores, with prices varying quite a bit. GM dealers show reman units under p/n 12607247. It seems all the online GM dealers are showing this unit at only $250 list (here’s one). That has to be a mistake in the GM parts database. I wonder if the mistake would be caught if one were ordered.
I’d either sell the car to someone who wants it as a fix-it-yourself’er, for cheap, or install the least expensive used transmission you can find that has fewer than 140K miles on it. For the latter you definitely want to use a well-recommended shop that offers a 12 month 12,000 mile warranty on parts and labor. If it works ok for that length of time and miles the job is probably gonna take. The prices you mention seem reasonable and competitive.
If I had that problem myself I’d sell the vehicle and purchase another that was configured w/ a manual transmission. Who needs this kind of trouble?
my dad recommended a shop that was highly rated (he knows some people that go there) and I ended up getting a quote for 1500, on a transmission with 119,000 miles, with a 1 year warranty. I think I’m going to go with that, and sell it like you said, but I’ll keep it for a little while. definitely strongly considering a manual after I’ve had two cars with automatics with problems shifting!