Tell me about the forgotten Honda, the Prelude

[Ankh87]

Hi all,

I'm wanting to get some info about the Gen 5 Prelude. This would be a 2nd car for me and I've seen a couple for sale on Gumtree & eBay. I know that these aren't popular so finding a good one will probably take time. I 100% do not want an auto.

I know nothing about these cars other than it has a H22A. Anyone else give me some more info on these?


Cheers

[designforlife]

They enjoy rusting.

That'll be your biggest hurdle tbh, finding a clean one.

[dobly]

^ As above. Add the fact that there are only 3 for sale in Japan at the moment says it all - surviving rust-free manual = rare.

[traffman]

LJK Setright was the man for the Prelude. If you can source the older CAR magazines he used to rave about the Prelude.

[chrismc1977]

That was the 4th Gen

The 2.2 VTEC was a superb coupe with 4ws & a revvy yet super smooth H22A.

My brother had a 95 M back in the day & it was a terrific car.

We now have a dog-earred N player as our track car. It hasn’t been out for some while-but is still a capable tool.

[Mattjevans]

Loved mine. As above, died of rust

[captain_tripping]

Was warned by a local garage against getting one of these. Finding parts is a nightmare apparently, not worth the effort unless you are a massive hobbyist and can buy up extra preludes for parts

[ElectricSoup]

Accord Coupe worth looking for too? 3.0 V6?

[mnaylor]

I have had a few 4th gen Preludes over the years and currently own a JDM only 5th gen Type S. Honda still stock most parts so I wouldn't worry about that. As with most 20 year old cars, look out for rust, these love to go on the rear arches, totally repairable but factor it in when buying. If you get a good one, get it undersealed and all should be good. Also, get youself over to ludegeneration.co.uk.

[JohnoVR6]

This is my current daily/ winter hack;



Bought it around five months ago, and have done around 5k miles in it since...absolutely love it. Very comfortable seats, superb ride quality, decent amount of poke and it sounds like a 90's BTCC car above 5.5k rpm. 4WS makes town driving/ parking an absolute dream too.

Couple of niggles with it (rear bumper alignment for one!) but considering it's a twenty year old car, it certainly doesn't look/ drive/ behave like one.

Is worth pointing out that the only downside to it, despite its manoeuvrability, is that it is a rather large car. There's only 50mm difference in length, and 100mm in width between this and a current generation CR-V...

[robbie_f]

to be fair i have never found rust to be any more or less of an issue than any other cars of the era. parts are getting hard to find but ive always found them to be robust enough. keep them clean underneath helps and if possible waxoyl the vulnerable areas.

by happy coincidence i have just found out that my current prelude was owned by ljk setright.

[Butter Face]

The only rust I ever had on my 5th gen was on the bootlid, it was very solid underneath.

Great car, massive on the outside and tiny on the inside Terrible fuel economy too, lovely to drive and a great cruiser. I had a genuine Motegi (with the bonnet spoiler too!)

Happy to help if you need anything else OP.

[mrtwisty]

An itch I never did scratch - i looked for a long while for a clean mk4 bb4 import (lightweight version of the mk4, manual with no rws) but could never find a good one that hadn't been barried to death (for context, this was around ten years ago, so the chances of finding one now are very low).

A friend took me out in his fettled mk4 once and it impressed me with its smooth screamer of a motor. Digital dash too iirc, super cool!

The mk5 was always considered as the more grown up cruiser of the bunch, but with less b-road potential. A good red Motegi is a beautiful sight. Haven't seen one for a good few years now though.

A Celica T-Sport is probably a better prospect if you're after something with more dynamic ability, and will be much easier to keep free of tinworm, but a mk5 'lude would make for a lovely and interestingly rare cruiser/town car.

[redchina]

I've had mine 15+ years, no rust whatsoever.

has had a new gearbox though - the auto's are weak and once they start slipping - there is no stopping it.

get the VTIR as a minimum and careful with fluids - then its easily maintained

[ali_XF]

Going to look at one of these tomorrow. 2000 2.2 VTi auto on 93k. I read somewhere that they revised the transmission for 99-01 models to minimise the issues people had- any tips on what to look out for other than a thump when changing gear? Do they have transmission oil dipsticks and if so whereabouts in the bay are they located?

[mrtwisty]

Cant help with the gearbox question, but a link to the advert would be good.

[thatdude]

ali_XF said:

Going to look at one of these tomorrow. 2000 2.2 VTi auto on 93k. I read somewhere that they revised the transmission for 99-01 models to minimise the issues people had- any tips on what to look out for other than a thump when changing gear? Do they have transmission oil dipsticks and if so whereabouts in the bay are they located?

Honda autos do have transmission oil dipsticks - they are easily identified in the engine bay, usualy have a yellow colour loop that you tug on to pull it out.

The honda automatic transmissions are quite different to a normal torque converter transmission; there are no planetary gearsets, instead the innards are much like a conventional manual, except the synchros etc are replaced by clutch packs. It's common that these can fail (wear out) giving rise to transmission issues. They have a few known failure points, there's a lot of videos on youtube from american trans specialists tearing them down and diagnosing the issues. It's worth noting that Honda do recommend oil change intervals, and its wise to stick to honda genuine ATF; the transmission filter is well embedded inside the transmission and is essentially non-serviceable, accessible only during a complete tear down I think. I think the oil change is as simple as drain the old oil (as much as you can) then top back up via the dipstick hole with ATF. As said, the auto units on this era of Honda's are known for stting out. There was a revision at some point.

[ali_XF]

Thanks for the info. Unfortunately the car sold before I could get to it (!) but I’m keeping my eyes peeled for another one.

[mrtwisty]

ali_XF said:

Thanks for the info. Unfortunately the car sold before I could get to it (!) but I’m keeping my eyes peeled for another one.

I take it you'll be holding out for a manual after the info on old Honda autos in this thread? (I had no idea)

Be sure to post a readers cars thread!

[woodytype S]

The only car I regret selling the Honda Prelude Type S