I'm taking an on ramp coming home from work, and I suddenly see/feel/hear the rpms shoot up. DAMN IT! I was hoping for the best, but then sure enought, the "check tranny" logo pops. on.

With the exception of the onramp, she felt fine. I put two and two together, and figure maybe she's low on fluid. I checked it when I got home, and nothing is even shown on the dip stick. I'm a mustang guy who just bought this car as a dialy driver, and really know nothing of it. I figure I can pick up some fluid at autozone/napa right? How hard is it to fill the tranny? Why do I have a feeling its going to be a b**** to fill? Oh, and after crawling under the car, I can see it does appear to be leaking fluid. Its not enough that its dripping, but enough that the tranny area is wet with fluid. Even worse, I just have a bad feeling about this requiring a trip to a shop, and a big hit to the pocketbook :'(

Any advice/comments are welcome.

Oh, btw, its a 97 civic EX.

 

good luck

 

If the tranny is slipping then you might have some real problems. If it is due to low fluid then its a relatively an easy fix but I am not sure if you are going to be that lucky. In the event that it is just low fluid, fluid is simply added at the tranny dip stick. Make sure that when you pick up automatic fluid that it specifically says for Honda transmissions. If you put regular tranny fluid then you could really screw things up. Come to think of it, that may be where the problem originated since you just picked it up. Good luck anyhow.

 

No, the past owner was the second owner, and gave me tons of records of having every oil change, and all other maintenance. So at least she tried, but then again the shop still could have used the wrong fluid.