CVT Longevity -

[syncro87]

Google Nissan CVT's, they're notably the worst on the market.

As far as Honda's CVT, Ktuner in another thread showed a tuned Civic under 220ftlb torque with zero scoring or evidence of wear on the rings or belt after a ton of track time.

Even if you blow one up, you can pull one off a totaled car in a junkyard or get a new one for ~$400 and swap it yourself. That's cheaper than a clutch, and a lot easier.

I'm surprised to see that salvage yard CVTs are indeed pretty cheap. I looked around on car-part.com and you can find tons of them for 2.0L cars for $600 give or take. The CVTs for the 1.5T cars seem to be tougher to find, although there are some out there and not for ridiculous money.

Part of why they are cheap at this point is probably lack of demand. There just aren't enough Civics out there with high miles or failed transmissions to create much of a market at this point. But still, it is encouraging that the supply seems decent and prices low.

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[a c i d.f l y]

I'm surprised to see that salvage yard CVTs are indeed pretty cheap. I looked around on car-part.com and you can find tons of them for 2.0L cars for $600 give or take. The CVTs for the 1.5T cars seem to be tougher to find, although there are some out there and not for ridiculous money.

Part of why they are cheap at this point is probably lack of demand. There just aren't enough Civics out there with high miles or failed transmissions to create much of a market at this point. But still, it is encouraging that the supply seems decent and prices low.

Because the CVT is not the part that fails.

 

[CivicXI]

I design products that use planetary gear sets. The Prius transmission is stupid simple, reliable, and robust. It's basically 1.5 stages of an automatic transmission

My memory's kinda fuzzy but basically, in a planetary gear cluster, u have a sun in the middle, planets rotating around it on a carrier, and a ring gear. An automatic transmission 1st gear has power coming into the carrier and coming out of the sun gear of the first stage. The ring gear just sits there and doesn't contribute but it's connected to the sun gear of 2nd stage, this is 1st gear. If the 2nd stage gear is spinning, that means stage one now has a different ratio, that's 2nd gear. The 2nd stage ring gear is connected to a 3rd stage. So now u have yet another gear ratio.

All these ratios are fixed per stage. But if u took just the first stage and instead of the ring gear being either completely stationary or spinning at a fixed speed, you vary the speed of the ring, you can form infinitely stepped ratios or even reverse. You can even do something creepy, which is having input from the engine spinning while the output is stationary but there's no clutch and all gears are completely meshed.

The whole Prius transmission has like, 7 moving parts if I remember correctly.

Two inaccuracies I'd like to correct, for the record, and with all due respect. Well, one inaccuracy and one clarification:

a) Nissan has had many issues with their CVTs, actually. As in, tons of issues over time. This doesn't necessarily mean Honda will have similar issues.

b) The CVT in the Prius is a completely different design than that found in most Nissans, Hondas, or most other CVT-equipped cars for that matter. Reliability of the Prius transmission says nothing about potential reliability of the Honda unit, with all due respect.


If you guys are worried about the CVT, the number one thing you can do to help it last is to change the fluid early. As in before 50k miles. I changed mine at 30k, and will change it again at 60k. The first change is the most important. You can probably extend the second change interval, but the early miles are where the trans breaks in and you end up with the most contamination in the fluid. Don't neglect that first change. I recommend 30k if you plan on keeping your car past 100k miles. It cost me a little under $100 at the dealership.

 

[mathdydx]

Two inaccuracies I'd like to correct, for the record, and with all due respect. Well, one inaccuracy and one clarification:

If you guys are worried about the CVT, the number one thing you can do to help it last is to change the fluid early. As in before 50k miles. I changed mine at 30k, and will change it again at 60k. The first change is the most important. You can probably extend the second change interval, but the early miles are where the trans breaks in and you end up with the most contamination in the fluid. Don't neglect that first change. I recommend 30k if you plan on keeping your car past 100k miles. It cost me a little under $100 at the dealership.

I'd like to know which dealerships are charging $100 for a transmission drain/fill. Most places around me (Northern VA) want around $150-$200 (for a drain/refill). And not that I would do a flush, but some of these places want $350-400 for a transmission flush. No thanks.

 

[k20martinez]

I think my civic with a cvt is pretty quick beats most cars on the road even some v6 models and I got some mods too

 

[clos714714]

I'd like to know which dealerships are charging $100 for a transmission drain/fill. Most places around me (Northern VA) want around $150-$200 (for a drain/refill). And not that I would do a flush, but some of these places want $350-400 for a transmission flush. No thanks.

Changing the transmission fluid is apparently supposed to be as easy as changing your oil. Haven’t done it yet myself, but if that’s the case, then that will save you quite a bit.

 

[Billy4202]

I'd like to know which dealerships are charging $100 for a transmission drain/fill. Most places around me (Northern VA) want around $150-$200 (for a drain/refill). And not that I would do a flush, but some of these places want $350-400 for a transmission flush. No thanks.

My dealer's $135, but then again I'm not really in NoVA, I'm out in the Valley. Even $200 is much more reasonable than what Ford charged in the past, so I'm good with it.

I'd do mine myself but apartment + neighbors with nothing to do but watch = no dice

 

[CivicXI]

Didn't car and driver test the CVT faster than the manual?

 

[CivicXI]

My dealer's $135, but then again I'm not really in NoVA, I'm out in the Valley. Even $200 is much more reasonable than what Ford charged in the past, so I'm good with it.

I'd do mine myself but apartment + neighbors with nothing to do but watch = no dice

Find friend with driveway?

 

[syncro87]

I'd like to know which dealerships are charging $100 for a transmission drain/fill. Most places around me (Northern VA) want around $150-$200 (for a drain/refill). And not that I would do a flush, but some of these places want $350-400 for a transmission flush. No thanks.

Kansas City metro area.



EDIT: found the receipt.

'16 EX-T sedan

C MAINT MINDER CODE 3 - Transmission service

4 08200-HCF2 FLUID (HCF-2) $13.28 ea x 4 = $53.12
1 90471-PX4-000 WASHER, DRAIN (18MM) $4.06

PARTS $57.18 LABOR $49.77 TOTAL LINE C: $106.95

Date of service 12/05/17
Mileage in 34,019

 

[gtman]

First of all, I've driven manual transmission cars for over 25 years but currently do drive a turbo Civic with the CVT. I just wanted to get that background info out of the way.

Now look, I get it. You can't compare the control you have with a manual to a CVT. In that sense a manual is way more fun. But calling non-manual Civics golf carts and not true Civics? Come on man.

Before I got a tune for my car, I was impressed with the turbo. The CVT for the most part played well with it and as was mentioned earlier the CVT is quicker to 60 than the manual. Not sure why you think they're so slow. Now that I'm tuned, 0-60 comes up in about 5.9 seconds on a good day with the CVT. Plenty quick and sporty for me.

 

[lunarsilver]

Honda uses a similar CVT design to Subaru's. As far as I know, there haven't been many instances of problems on the Subaru forums. In fact, they have a CVT in their WRX, which makes a lot more torque and power than the Civic and SI. They've been using CVT's for the past 10 years with relatively few problems. I trust that Honda came in late to take advantage of other's mistakes early on.

Had a 14 forester, 1st cvt to me..... It was awesome ... Motor felt alot stronger than it was because of that cvt..... I feel the same in my 16 Ext

 

[n9yty]

Okay, have to admit this thread was making me panic... LoL But I guess time will tell. I'm not overly hard on my car, occasional little sprints but not frequent and not for long periods of time. So driving it as an average car, I hope to get a long life out of it. Too late to panic now, I'd surely take a huge loss trying to get out from under it at this point anyway. And what would I get? I happen to like the car. LoL

 

[CobraCommand]

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