Hi !

Unfortunately Honda Dealers in Germany have very little experience with the S2000 which is the reason I would like to ask you for your help and knowhow on some technical questions and symptoms.
On the next service I would like to advise them to watch out for certain things, because otherwise I just get the answer “that is normal”

Facts: S2000 / Year 2007 / 54k Kilometers on it (only driven in summer)

First:
I always have the feeling that something is wrong with my clutch or gearbox.
Last year clutch fluid went dry and I installed a new slave and master cylinder. Transmission fluid was changed recently and I am about to regrease the shifter. Master Cylinder is set to zero clutch free play.
Symptoms: when I push the clutch pedal and want to put the shifter into gear it always feels like I have to wait 1 second before I can shift without problems. Otherwise the shifter feels hard to move. I also noted that this experience changes day by day and also with the weather conditions (Hot/Cold/Wet). It feels different all the time. Just take today as an example. It’s around 18°C this morning and shifting was quite smoothly. But there are also days when it shifts like a bitch and I have this time gap to go into gear without problems.
Does anybody of you have an idea what this could be? Is my clutch bad? Are the gearbox synchros done?

Second:
pushing the gas pedal I sometimes recognize a slack like the chain is not tensioned enough and full throttle kicks in place with delay and a hitch. It does not sound like the timing chain tensioner is faulty. At least I don’t notice any loud rattle sounds from the engine bay
At low speeds, low gear it also happens that the car stutters when pushing the gas pedal.

Third:
I had a squeaking noise coming from the engine bay when starting the engine.
It sounded like it was coming from a spinning part. It has gone over the time but now up on cold start the engine sounds also much louder than I can remember.
It might be the fan (which I dont think so) but I haven’t noticed this noice before. It will go off after 1-2 minutes of driving.

--> let Honda check acessory belt and pullys.

Fourth:
last summer when accelerating around 60-100 km/h I had a short squeaking coming from the front axle. It is gone now but should I get my wheel bearings checked?

Any advice and or experience on those 4 topics is highly appreciated.

Thanks a lot!

 

Welcome to Forum!

For Number 1, could be the transmission fluid being used. I've used Royal Purple Synchromax and like it.

For Number 3, the accessory belt maybe getting old.

Good luck!

 

It sounds lile you have motorcycle experience. Most bikes use a chain final drive, and as you point out, slack in the chain, or anywhere in final drive, can cause an experience referred to by bike guys as snatch. The result is an annoying throttle response delay. The S2000 of course doesn't have chain drive, its a propshaft, to a diff, to a pair of driveshafts. This Assembly though can develop wear, and snatch like slack in drivetrain. With rear wheels off the ground, car in neutral, e brake engaged, from under rotate prop shaft by hand in one direction, then the other, checking for total play, or slack.

If it seems excessive, try and locate where the slack is most pronounced. Your mileage is low, so it would seem odd to have that much wear. One issue some have had is the pinion nut, that connects propshaft yoke to diff, has become loose, and introduced excessive drivetrain play. Usually retorquing this nut resolves that issue.

Your underhood squeak sounds like a belt driven pully bearing. The tensioner pully, the idler pully, etc. Remove belt. Rotate all pulleys by hand. Check for gritty feel as you turn them. Then spin them fast, and listen for noise. Replace any that seem suspect. You can buy just the bearings, and diy replace them much cheaper than buying new pulleys.

Try starting car with belt removed. If noise still occurs, its not a belt driven pully. Don't run car very long with belt removed, or you'll overheat and damage engine.

The clutch issue, I would first gravity bleed the system. There are diy instructions on this forum, search for them. Make sure all the old fluid is exchanged.

The symptoms are clearly clutch drag. This could be caused by not enough clutch fork travel (rod misadjusted, air in fluid, or not enough clutch pedal travel). Or by clutch disk not sliding easily on its splines.

The clutch pedal travel is adjusted by clutch pedal resting height, which is adjusted by the clutch pedal electrical switch. Try giving yourself more clutch pedal travel.

The disk itself needs clean, well lubed splines to slide on. Clutch dust, old grease, and cold temps can make the grease not as effective as it was new. If the clutch was ever replaced, I would blame the installers for not using enough, or the wrong kind, of grease. Its too costly to remove trans just to relube old clutch grease. But that may be the only way to make it perfect again. But you can make it close to perfect by:

Shifting at 4k rpm or higher

Keeping rod adjusted

Replace fluid in mc resevoir at every oil change interval (this keeps all the fluid fresh, as each pedal press mixes the fluid around)

Proper pedal height (travel)

Good, fresh trans fluid

 

first of all thanks for the feedback.

I forgot to mention that I have replaced all fluids already:

Motor: LiquiMoly Hightech Synchoil
Transmission: OEM Honda
Differential: Amsoil

First:
as for the clutch problem it really feels like Car Analogy described that the splines do not sliding in easily.
I have bleeded the system with the installation of the new master and slave cylinder.
Billman250 made posts about this as well and his recommondation is setting the master to zero clutch free play.
So I did this and yes it got a little bit better but still on cold start or whenever the car decides sometimes its not feeling like easy shifting.

In most cases on cold start when the engine revs up it feels very smooth for 2 minutes and then gets tougher to shift

Third:
I will definately let them check acessory belt and pullys.

I will update my problems with comments and progress in fixing them so that others might find a solution as well

 

Your Second issue sounds like a low rev, DBW hesitation? This has been discussed in its own thread. I think that the last thing I saw was that it may be corrected by replacing the accelerator pedal position sensor. I say "may be corrected" because there may be multiple causes for this issue, but this solution has worked for at least a couple of DBW S owners.