Just got my car this week. Enjoy and appreciate reading the opinions and information on this forum. Here are my first impressions:
Pros: plain fun to drive. My wife and I love it. Here in So Calif is perfect place for having the top down. My friends love the look of the car. I think the car's best feature is the way it hugs the road in turns. This is my first sports car so I am used to sedans as a comparison.
Cons: I have the 1/2 shift grinding when cold as mentioned in another post. The car is bumpy on the freeway. 6th gear is not as low as I expected. Again this is my first sports car so I am not sure what to expect. At 65 MPH, I'm at 3600 RPM. Not great for gas mileage. I expected better at freeway speeds. What happens when you go 80 MPH+? Haven't gone over 5K RPM yet...but the engine must be whine like crazy when you do. A little low on torque from a stop, but again not in VTEC mode yet.

Would appreciate any comments on my expectations.

 

Congratuluations on your purchase of an excellent sportscar. You will learn to shift better with the 1/2 shift grind as time goes on, take it easy when cold....doesn't do it when warmed up.
This car is not for those who want fuel economy....it is a sportscar meant to be driven hard and as such will drink fuel faster than say a normal sedan.
Wait until you have 600+ miles on her then open her up reving past 6000 RPM and wait for the fun......The engine is designed to be a high reving engine. Low end torque is somewhat wanting (but less so in 2004 model) until you get above about 3000 RPM, and above 6000RPM VTEC takes over and WOW! You will love it!
My advice? Drive it like you hate it or you will never love it. LOL

 

I'm about 3 weeks and 750 miles into my new '04 as well, but coming from riding sportbikes the last 5 years as my primary mode of transportation (have an '03 CBR-954RR right now) I love having a car that keeps the RPM right around what I am used to. Like ronnuke mentioned, it takes a little time to get used to the shifting if you aren't used to it, but you should get the hang of it quickly.

Regarding the low on torque from a stop, once you have passed your base break-in period, and you can wind it to higher RPM's you should get more of the punch that you are looking for off the line.

The freeway bumps are just part of the package when dealing with this car's tight suspension from what I can gather. Personally I find it pretty smooth on the 101 (my main route to and from work).

BTW.... 6th gear doing about 95 I find the LED barely over 5k RPM since you asked.

 

I remember driving my FIAT 124 spider on the freeway at almost 4000 rpm at 65 mph in 5th gear. For its time ( early-1970s ) that was the highest reving sports car most Americans could afford, and it's redline was 7000 rpm IIRC. Low end torque....what low end torque? 1438 cc engine, ca. 2500# car.

 

Dave

Congratulations - That smile you have won't go away 'til you sell the S.
Let the car warm up before doing any fancy shifting (3-4 bars on the temp), you'll find the crunch goes away. Also, be very carefull when you shift til you get very familar with the car. I went into the wrong gear 3 or 4 times just after I got mine and I was lucky I recovered b4 any damage was done - It's real easy to go from 3>2 and if your wound up in 3rd when this happens - well, lets just say picking up engine pieces is messy
6th gear is a crusing gear. If you're going less than 65-70 and need to pass, drop into 3rd (3rd gear redline is 80mph), 4th is good for 102, 5th will get you to 126. Here is a site that gives rear wheel speeds in any gear at any RPM for the MY04 RWS Calculator. Learn to rev match and you will have no problems.
BTW, my '04 has about 4700 miles on it and I'm getting 30+MPG freeway at 70. and I expect it to improve as it breaks in.

FWIW, Consumers Reports stated their real world freeway mileage was 36mpg. I don't remember if they stated speed but I suspect it was low, like 55-60. Still impressive though.

You don't need to be at/in vtec to launch. I find that a normal start at 2k RPM will give a smooth launch with no bog. 3-4k will give an agressive launch specially if you put the hammer down as soon as the clutch is fully engaged I've never tried launching at 6k+, I like my S and try my best not to beat her up.
Also, you're going to have a tough time breaking loose those RE050's. If this is something you want to do I've read you need to pump up the rears to 40psi. They're just to sticky at 32psi.

Enjoy and drive safe

Erik

 

Your car will get better gas mileage later on.....

My car has 11,500 miles, and I switched to synthetic oil at 10,000. I used Amsoil, and just like their promise, I did get better gas mileage. For comparison....I go to Atlantic city all the time.

Before the synthetic oil and like 4-6000 miles, my car would get about 250 miles for the tank (10 gallons)

I went to SEMA yesterday, top down to Atlantic city, and got 322.4 miles to the tank. (10.6 gallons) Average speed was 80mph (was on cruise control) with occasional triple digit spurts)

So dont worry. The RPMs might be high for normal cars, but for the S2k, its normal.

 

For me its waht it is, a kick ass japese sports car which mere mortals can afford!!! In my biased totaly blinded opinion there is not one thing I dislike about the car so far. Granted I have only had it a day and have only done about 3 hours of driving in it, but it is a total dream!!!

 

You'll be surprised how good the gas mileage is even at those high rpm's. This engine was designed for the revs so don't let it bother you that they are higher than what you're used to on the freeway. Sixth gear was purposely geared that way to give you some actual pull from it contrary to the sixth gears used by most manufacturers that cause the car to run at an extremely low rpm(i.e. Corvette). The noise is simply something you'll just have to learn to live with. It's part of owning this sportscar and should have been considered prior to purchase.

Regarding the shifting, this is an extremely common issue and you could learn quite a bit from searching this topic. The key to good shifting is the slight pause between the gears to allow the syncro's to align properly. The only gear shifts that are slightly notchy on my car are the common 1-2, and 2-3. Use this method and see if it helps you.

Clutch in, 1st to neutral, pause for a nano-second or so(essentially don't powershift), down to 2nd gear.

Like other's have said this is mainly a problem which is noticed when the tranny fluid is cold. After 10-15 minutes of driving around these touchy attributes taper off and the shifting will become smoother.

 

Appreciate the responses. Have read quite a few threads on the 1/2 shift issue since yesterday. I will be honest...my first reaction is to worry a little. It is hard to know exactly how many owners this turns into a real problem for. It is obvious there is a design issue here. We should not have to play all these "games" for the car to shift correctly when cold or otherwise. I hope this is not going to ruin the enjoyment of the car for me as time goes on.

I will try the pause in cold shifting as mentioned in the last post.

 

The cold 1-2 grind is a small price to pay for having the best gearbox in the world.