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are CVT's more or less reliable than traditional auto trans?

soccerballtux said:
150k? Stop buying American
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You're right, imports are so much better

2002 Honda accord
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Honda/Accord/2002/
2002 Ford Taurus
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Ford/Taurus/2002/

I thought Taurus was the one known for transmission problems???

I am not eager to jump on the CVT bandwagon just yet, most vehicles with CVTs haven't been in production long enough to reach 150k miles yet. I'll wait until CVTs have been in mass production vehicles for at least 10 years and have proven to repeatably run 150k without having problems before considering one over a conventional auto trans.
 
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Haven't heard of any major issues with CVTs. For what it's worth Nissan doubled the warranty on their CVTs to 10 years/120,000 miles to alleviate owner concerns. I got a letter from them several months ago.

The CVT on my 2007 Versa has worked great.
 
I have 28k on mine in the last year. No problems at all. I like it much more than traditional automatics. It's smooth as can be with no real gears. When it "downshifts" going up hill your RPM's only go up a hundred at a time, not a sudden thousand RPM jump.
 
kornphlake said:
You're right, imports are so much better

2002 Honda accord
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Honda/Accord/2002/
2002 Ford Taurus
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Ford/Taurus/2002/

I thought Taurus was the one known for transmission problems???

I am not eager to jump on the CVT bandwagon just yet, most vehicles with CVTs haven't been in production long enough to reach 150k miles yet. I'll wait until CVTs have been in mass production vehicles for at least 10 years and have proven to repeatably run 150k without having problems before considering one over a conventional auto trans.
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While I agree with your sentiment, 2001-2 Civics are defective from the factory(though Honda won't admit it) and are known to die at 80k miles. My girlfriend has an '01, which fortunately lasted till... 150k. My trials and tribulations with that were well chronicled here.. lol

It seems that all manufacturers have their good and bad transmission models, just as they do engine models. GM and Toyota seem to be able to make a nice automatic transmission, though.

Unfortunately, I have no data for the OP. However, conventional wisdom would lead me to believe that they have at least the potential to be much more reliable than an automatic transmission. Fewer wear/friction parts.

Also, I would imagine that when they break, it is a much more simple(and therefor cheaper) fix than with an automatic.

One could even hope that it was in line dollar wise with a clutch replacement. That would be pretty cool, especially if they turn out to last 200k miles or more like a clutch can.

Jumpem said:
I have 28k on mine in the last year. No problems at all. I like it much more than traditional automatics. It's smooth as can be with no real gears. When it "downshifts" going up hill your RPM's only go up a hundred at a time, not a sudden thousand RPM jump.
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28k in a year? Hmm, not bad. Report back in another 5 years. 😛
 
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Most will have a torque convertor. The one in the Prius doesn't, though, to my knowledge, but it's a very strange transmission and not like CVTs found in other vehicles.
 
kornphlake said:
You're right, imports are so much better

2002 Honda accord
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Honda/Accord/2002/
2002 Ford Taurus
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Ford/Taurus/2002/

I thought Taurus was the one known for transmission problems???

I am not eager to jump on the CVT bandwagon just yet, most vehicles with CVTs haven't been in production long enough to reach 150k miles yet. I'll wait until CVTs have been in mass production vehicles for at least 10 years and have proven to repeatably run 150k without having problems before considering one over a conventional auto trans.
Click to expand...


cherry picking a two years of bad accord transmissions out of how many again?
 
evident said:
cherry picking a two years of bad accord transmissions out of how many again?
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Okay then, the problems were corrected after 2002 right?

How about the 2005 oddysey:
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Honda/Odyssey/2002/index.shtml

Compared to a 2005 Chrysler van, also notorious for transmission problems:
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Chrysler/Town_Country/2005/index.shtml

Hmm, how are we doing now?

Poor Honda, I'm just picking on them right?

2004 Mazda 3:
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Mazda/MAZDA3/2004/index.shtml

2004 Dodge Neon:
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Dodge/Neon/2004/index.shtml

Am I cherry picking a little bit, you bet, although I was surprised that I could compare a Neon to a Mazda3. Every manufacturer has had their share of borked auto transmissions, with few exceptions. To make a blanket statement that all domestics are garbage and all imports are da bomb shows a degree of ignorance.
 
Eli said:
Also, I would imagine that when they break, it is a much more simple(and therefor cheaper) fix than with an automatic.

One could even hope that it was in line dollar wise with a clutch replacement. That would be pretty cool, especially if they turn out to last 200k miles or more like a clutch can.
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Going by what I've read from mechanics, CVTs are un-rebuildable. There's been a few cases where people put regular ATF instead of the special Nissan fluid into theirs and completely FUBAR'd it, and the only option is buying a brand new unit.
 
kornphlake said:
Okay then, the problems were corrected after 2002 right?

How about the 2005 oddysey:
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Honda/Odyssey/2002/index.shtml

Compared to a 2005 Chrysler van, also notorious for transmission problems:
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Chrysler/Town_Country/2005/index.shtml

Hmm, how are we doing now?

Poor Honda, I'm just picking on them right?

2004 Mazda 3:
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Mazda/MAZDA3/2004/index.shtml

2004 Dodge Neon:
http://www.carcomplaints.com/Dodge/Neon/2004/index.shtml

Am I cherry picking a little bit, you bet, although I was surprised that I could compare a Neon to a Mazda3. Every manufacturer has had their share of borked auto transmissions, with few exceptions. To make a blanket statement that all domestics are garbage and all imports are da bomb shows a degree of ignorance.
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You forgot the CVT in the Saturn VUEs. Those things failed so routinely GM was sued by a ton of owners. GM even bought back a ton of VUEs with failed CVTs. Now, in their defense the CVT they used was designed and built by FIAT. A complete garbage transmission.
 
SJP0tato said:
Going by what I've read from mechanics, CVTs are un-rebuildable. There's been a few cases where people put regular ATF instead of the special Nissan fluid into theirs and completely FUBAR'd it, and the only option is buying a brand new unit.
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Hmm.. That doesn't make much sense. I mean, anything is rebuildable technically.. Maybe it's just prohibitively expensive? That would suck. If that's the case, they had better last at least 200k miles.
 
Kaervak said:
You forgot the CVT in the Saturn VUEs. Those things failed so routinely GM was sued by a ton of owners. GM even bought back a ton of VUEs with failed CVTs. Now, in their defense the CVT they used was designed and built by FIAT. A complete garbage transmission.
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The Ford Freestyle also had a garbage CVT, it was discontinued after 3 model years and renamed the Taurus X with a conventional automatic transmission, there was not a class action law suit as far as I know, but I don't believe the Freestyle was as popular as the VUE. The Ford CVT was designed in Germany by ZF Friedchshafen apparently a significant number of parts used to assemble the transmission came from Germany as it was stamped "Made in Germany" despite being assembled in the USA.
 
Eli said:
Hmm.. That doesn't make much sense. I mean, anything is rebuildable technically.. Maybe it's just prohibitively expensive? That would suck. If that's the case, they had better last at least 200k miles.
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Some things can't be dissasembled without destroying a major portion of the components. If I had a plastic water pistol with a broken pump I could cut the housing in half, remove the tube that connects the pump to the nozzle and reuse that part in the assembly of a new water pistol from a majority of new parts, but I wouldn't consider reusing one piece in an assembly rebuilding, I'd call it recycling.

The CVT used in the Ford Freestyle cost $6000 to replace, I don't know if it was rebuildable, but parts were not available the only available part through Ford was a complete transmission.
 
Skoorb said:
Most will have a torque convertor. The one in the Prius doesn't, though, to my knowledge, but it's a very strange transmission and not like CVTs found in other vehicles.
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Nor does any hybrid built by Ford or Toyota.

It's more of a PST(power-split transmission) than a CVT. It's "CVT like" but nothing like a traditional CVT.

But unless someone wants more details I'll spare the technical details for now.
 
Jumpem said:
My last car had a five speed auto and downshifts were 800-1000 RPM jumps.
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Just from going up a hill?

Most autos will just drop out of overdrive.

Have to be a big hill to require a sudden 1K jump, as claimed, imo. And if it's a big hill, then the jump is expected, and if you had a manual, you'd also be rowing. 😀
 
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