AHall42631

Hello,

My 93 Prelude Si stopped shifting and I had to have it towed back to my house. I toyed around with it and thought it was the shift arm assembly on the transmission. When I would try to shift gears the shifter was very loose and the car would not go into gear. I took the car to the Honda shop because the rear seat belt stopped working and they replaced it due to the lifetime warranty on seat belts. I also had them look at the shifting problem. I was told it was the shift cables and it would cost $744!!!

I told them I would do the repair. So I took the cables off and when I move both cables the ends of both cables move. Does this mean the cables are defective? I do not want to order more cables if these are not bad.

AHall42631

Someone must have some answers on shift cables

kpaii_t

I dont know a alot but i would think if the cable ends move then they are good maybe something in the tranny? all the cables do is move the gears in the tranny try shifting it by hand on the tranny with the arm and go from there you should be able to hear it shifting and it would be lose.

but like i said i dont know alot but its worth a try.

AHall42631

Thanks for the response. Actually I can shift the car into gear using the shift arm assembly on the transmission. So it is something between the shifter and the shift arms. At first I thought may some bolts were loose which was causing the cables to move around when shifted, but when I took everything apart all bolts were tight and the cable was well secured. I did notice that one cable moved the shift arm on the transmission but the other had no effect.

I guess I will see when the cables arrive. Hopefully this resolves the problem as the cables are pretty expensive, but the Honda should did tell me it was the cables. So we will see.

wisortho

where did you order your cables from. i too am in need of some new cables.

AHall42631

I purchased them from hondapartsunlimited. Be advised that it took about two weeks for me to receive them because they did not have them in stock. They have good prices, but if they have to order anything that is not in stock it takes two weeks to get to me.

Also be sure that you need cables before ordering.

H22_PWR

Sounds like cables to me. Inspect the material that the actual cables go through. Usually with time and/or beating on your transmission will cause that material to crack. So even though the actual cable is not broken, when the material i cracked or broken it gives in to the motion of the cables. Therefore the force applied at one end (shifter) does not translate to the force at the other end (transmission). Hope that makes sense, lol

AHall42631

Makes sense to me. My problem did turn out to be the cable. But I also had a problem inside of the shift arm assembly. The bolt that secures the shift lever inside the shift arm assembly was sheared off. This allowed the shift lever to rotate more than it should and thus the car would not go into the gears 1, 3 or 5. Do not confuse the shift arm assembly mounted on the transmission with the shift mechanism inside the car. So if you find that your car will shift into some gears like 2, 4 and reverse only or 1, 3 and 5 only you should check this mechanism rather than junking the transmission or taking it to a repair shop. It is easy to remove the cover and check it without removing the transmission. However the cover is secured with liquid gasket so you will need to hit it to remove it.

Hope this helps someone.

1996PreludeVTEC

also you can get shift cables from hmotorsonline for less than $200 shipped