HELP something went down my dipstick hole

Status
Not open for further replies.
Originally Posted by brages
At this point, I'd fill it up again and hope for the best. Your borescope video looked pretty clear to me, so if you looked down the dipstick hole and in the drain hole and you can't see it, I see only two options:

1. The PVC tube fell out somewhere else around the engine
2. The PVC tube slipped down somewhere deep, deep into this transmission's guts

So either it's nothing, or it's so deep down that you would have to basically rebuild/replace the transmission (which it is probably in need of anyway, since it's acting up) to fix it. (This transmission doesn't have a "pan" as such; it must be split.)

So I say, cross your fingers, fill it up, and start saving up for a new transmission or a different car. You may want to replace the transmission filter after driving it awhile, just on the odd chance that pieces of the tube are getting stuck in it.


Can someone tell me how to remove the transmission guide tube? :p I am stymied by this one thing all the sudden. I didn't do it for days because my back was out again so everything's been sitting until I could at least walk out to the car again, still unmoved. Was thinking "oh by the look of it I should pull the starter first" because before my light was crap, now in daylight it's like.. oh... looks like just one bolt holding it on. (same bolt that holds part of the starter power cable) So I pull it out... and the trans dipstick doesn't want to move.

Parts #31/9/25/23 A/B there https://dz310nzuyimx0.cloudfront.ne...6de/dcccafa1d02c5547669b085df199c65c.gif looks like just a single bolt - that bolt is out - but it's not coming out and I didn't just want to muscle it and create a whole new problem to add to the others. Removed bolt #25, on bracket #9, and I can slightly rotate the tube (so it's not stuck just under there) but it's very very firmly not going anywhere. I exerted enough force I was afraid more would break it before taking a time out.

Trying to avoid going ape____ which leads to bad things, I don't know if it's just held on by rust somehow on the side or if there's another hidden bolt somewhere. I've also google searched and looked in what was a 7200 page factory manual download and couldnt find a suggestion on removing the stupid guide tube believe it or not...

I just wanted to pull off the dipstick tube to try and get a better borescope video which i'll post for all to see - where I can aim it around more (instead of just going down) and try to get around some of the light-shine and such making it hard to see inside.

Just in case the tube IS just out of the immediate light under the stick.


Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Good luck.
Start that bad-boy!


I was wanting to give one last shot at "peering at whatever could conveniently be looked at with the borescope". At least with the trans dipstick guide tube out anyways. Maybe down the 24mm normal ATF filler hole which I didn't use cuz I couldn't find a 24mm socket (i'm sure it's misplaced) in the first place, and also seemed a bit inaccessible. (to avoid doubleposting just a day later if I want to try that too, if others fill via this hole, do you remove things to get better access which aren't a huge hassle to put back on after?)

If I dont see anything after the better borehole inspection i'll probably just cross my fingers and try to drive it I suppose. If it's junk it's junk/it's more work to continue messing with than I have energy for when I need to focus on getting something else working instead.


Originally Posted by Ducked
Floating it out (if it's there) not possible? (IF it floats)


The thick PVC is denser than ATF by far, tho thanks for the idea.
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted by meep
bet you it's an open cavity 6" below the dipstick hole and it's laying there on it's side on the bottom of the pan.

plastic will barely scar the gears IF it were to tangle.

it won't get into the hydraulics due to the pickup screen.

the moving parts are not submerged in the oil.

If it made it to the pan, drive it.

If it didn't, how will you know? rock it back and forth 2" in gear, then drive it.

I've opened ATs and found metal parts in the pans and you'd never know it by how it drove.


Did you check my videos btw? I got video of the pan from the borescope, though I couldn't tilt it to the sides to check better. (was wanting to do that before giving up and driving but the dipstick guide tube seems stuck after removing what should have been the only bolt)

If you are familiar with this trans, is there any way to fish items out of the pan via the starter hole or the 24mm ATF fill bolt? Originally I wanted to pull the starter seeing if I could, but if it's a fools errand I better stop turning wrenches risking more problems each time.
 
Like just to clarify struggling with the stupid dipstick guide tube, I just used a CROWBAR and have now bent the metal of the bracket sideways... doesn't look like there's any other bolts holding it there... yet the dipstick tube seems so firmly attached to the transmission it might as well be welded. Is it supposed to be like that?? Do I have to destroy the O-ring to remove it or something, and if I do will that have any problem if I can't immediately replace it?

I'm just baffled how it could be so tight UNLESS there is something i'm not aware of. (like some kind of twist lock or.. I dont know... how can I know... it just doesn't seem like it should be THIS tight)
 
35.gif
 
Originally Posted by 53' Stude
35.gif



...yeah thats kind of why I had a bad attitude earlier in the thread. I'm so crippled up I can barely walk out to the vehicle, struggling to fix something that shouldn't have happened so I can get back to the tent city homeless camp in minneapolis needing to get some homeless friends some help who don't have anyone else to help them before the first snow of the year turns things life threatening, and my drama and frustration is just amusing...


If someone has serviced one of these transmissions and needed to remove this dumb trans filler tube that seems impossibly impossibly tight though i'd appreciate their insight. Just at least to verify it's SUPPOSED to just slide up vertically without some secret wierd locking twist or other thing i'm not aware of. Is there someone that knows this from personal experience? Please?
 
Either yank harder, wiggle it side-to-side, or find a way to pry it upward.

But in all honesty, I would just drive the car.

Capture.PNG
 
One piece of advice I can give is don't work on a car when you're angry, agitated or very frustrated. It usually results in a tunnel vision where even simple tasks become difficult, stuff starts breaking and you don't understand why.

And I agree with others, I would just leave it alone.
 
Originally Posted by KrisZ
One piece of advice I can give is don't work on a car when you're angry, agitated or very frustrated. It usually results in a tunnel vision where even simple tasks become difficult, stuff starts breaking and you don't understand why.


Or when you are tired, rushed or in a hurry. I break those rules regularly and sometimes pay dearly for it, but we all live and learn. Just have a contingency plan in place.
 
Originally Posted by The Critic
Either yank harder, wiggle it side-to-side, or find a way to pry it upward.

But in all honesty, I would just drive the car.


Well... i'm glad that I waited... because I GOT IT OUT. I mean my original plastic piece of @*&#$ that fell in.


First thing though, the trans guide tube was just stuckstuck - I didnt want to use a vise grip at first, but I finally got the right vector of force with it when I realized I could put the dipstick back in, and that would prevent the thin wall tubing from collapsing, so I tightened the vise grip around the top of the tube with the dipstick in it, and could finally tilt, turn, rotate, and wiggle, and then it finally came up and stopped fighting me.

Once that was out, the view inside the transmission was MUCH easier with the borescope, I could wiggle it back and forth, and I SAW THE PLASTIC PVC PIPE SEGMENT just in the pan out of visibility from when I put the borescope straight down.

Getting it out was NOT easy, but I finally figured out a way. I used the borescope and a spring-loaded grabby arm first to grab it using the camera as a guide. The hole was too small to pull it back out directly. But I got my clothes hanger (with a tiny L-shape at the end) in as well, and managed to thread the tip of that through the middle of the PVC tube while the grabber had it. The tiny L-kink I put in the end I then turned upwards, so that it was hooked onto the clothes hanger. I then removed borescope first, grabber next, and finally the clothes hanger still holding the piece of PVC plastic.


I'm glad I waited and tried to fix it the right way.

I'm sorry to people I frustrated whose well meaning advice I didn't appreciate.

But I just filled it back up with transmission fluid, shifted it into gear and it DROVE! Just fine. Well as fine as it was before - I mean a month back it had that slipped shift or two I was still all paranoid about.
smile.gif
The point is the [censored] thing isn't dead in the water hopeless and taking up a parking space unusably... it MOVES again, for at least whatever transmission life remains on the vehicle.

I might post one last borehole video, I was trying to record the rescue but i'd hit the camera button instead of the video button and stopped worrying about the pic anyways just wanting the nightmare to be over and done with and for this moment it is. (minus one destroyed semester at college and a lost job now, but i'm back to being able to at least get the vehicle around town in the meanwhile hopefully to figure out what to do next including getting back to medical care which is part of why I can barely walk right now having missed for weeks on end) But I might post one anyways, and review the borescope while i'm at it for the board.
 
Congrats, love to hear a good ending to a nightmare.
Rest in peace and buy yourself a thin long funnel and never ever have to rig up something that could ruin your peace of mind.
 
How lucky are you that this piece of PVC had a hole in it to hook into !?!?
 
Originally Posted by hallstevenson
How lucky are you that this piece of PVC had a hole in it to hook into !?!?


Well if it hadn't, it wouldn't have been much use as a hose extension to pour liquid down the trans dipstick guide hole either. :p The main other lesson to learn is... have a hose so long that even if it went down to the bottom it would just hit bottom and not fall all the way in. Like two feet of hose isn't going anywhere, 4 inches is what got lost down there.

Regardless I mostly consider this topic closed since the video I thought I shot didn't turn out at all (all out of focus and sunlight reflections) so i'll try to make a separate review of the borescope and post that for public interest. It IS a pretty nifty borescope...
 
We had an '05 Odyssey with the V6 so I suspect the transmission was similar. The fill port is down there pretty deep but there are funnels designed almost perfectly for this type of application. On a car, it will be even easier. These funnels aren't anything special either, I bought mine at Walmart or AutoZone for less than $10.
 
Hey columnshift,

Congratulations, you must feel a sense of accomplishment and have gained confidence in your abilities to problem solve. I am sorry about your medical problems, the lost semester at school, and the lost job. Hopefully the medical problems will respond in time to renewed treatment. You might try to recover tuition and fees for the semester lost. If your job has no more understanding or empathy for your situation maybe they are not worth working for, unemployment is way down and hopefully you will find another job that works around school. Don't let this be a setback, learn, and move forward. Life can knock you down, it is getting back up that is difficult. I think you have shown you will be OK. Good luck.

Scott
 
Originally Posted by hallstevenson
We had an '05 Odyssey with the V6 so I suspect the transmission was similar. The fill port is down there pretty deep but there are funnels designed almost perfectly for this type of application. On a car, it will be even easier. These funnels aren't anything special either, I bought mine at Walmart or AutoZone for less than $10.


The trans should be identical... do you have a link to this magical funnel?? :p I see ones online but i'm not quite sure... Everywhere I dropped into - walmart, orielly's, napa, seemed to have the same [censored] 3 useless funnels none of which fits let alone reaches the honda dipstick tube and I must've bought six other funnels since that still dont work. I definately didnt see it at walmart in person. I need to order it instantly. Everything else I try just doesn't fit the DIPSTICK. (capitalizing to be sure were not talking the 24mm 'proper' trans fill port but the far easier to access albeit far slower to fill transmission dipstick guide tube)

The stupid thing is that I HAD an old funnel that worked perfectly which got accidently stepped on by my friend right after we drained the trans fluid out. Since the car was already up on ramps and had the fluid out and no other running vehicle between us (nor available for borrowing) I had no way to put fluid back in, I had no choice but to improvise my solution using PVC tubing taped onto an existing funnel to fit the hole.

Necessity and perhaps carelessness/lack of paranoia created all this two week nightmare. (had I used a real long segment of PVC tubing it couldn't have gone down so quick and deeply without the ability to grab)

For the current refill I literally had to use the same stupid system with a segment of PVC hose, I just had a white knuckle grip and had it 3 feet long this time so nothing could happen again. As soon as I see a link that someone else says worked for them for the 'right' funnel i'm going to instantly order two.
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted by boulderdentist
Hey columnshift,

Congratulations, you must feel a sense of accomplishment and have gained confidence in your abilities to problem solve. I am sorry about your medical problems, the lost semester at school, and the lost job. Hopefully the medical problems will respond in time to renewed treatment. You might try to recover tuition and fees for the semester lost. If your job has no more understanding or empathy for your situation maybe they are not worth working for, unemployment is way down and hopefully you will find another job that works around school. Don't let this be a setback, learn, and move forward. Life can knock you down, it is getting back up that is difficult. I think you have shown you will be OK. Good luck.

Scott


Thanks for the kind words, I feel bad about snapping at some people but it was alot of stress.I was facing literal homelessness if this went much worse. I still cant believe things got this bad right after I did 'charitable things' for others, I thought good karma was supposed to be a thing.

I now have between me and friend/roommate one partially running truck and now the Honda again running (for however long the transmission lasts, no i'm not going to rely on it so my hackles aren't down yet... however I have other broken cars I can still try to bring back to running again which i'm trying to do next, it's just harder once snow flies) but the semester is a total write off and so is the job because its "my responsibility to have reliable transportation" they said and I showed that I dont. Some classes I can claim incomplete status and make up work but not all, and if I tried I couldn't take a fulltime 19 credit load on the new semester because I just got too far behind. I only had 6 credits this fall so it's not the end of the world but it's still $2000 tuition wasted.

I'm just trying to pick up temp work to make it until january, get more school loans, and then find something else workstudy at the school. If current or soon to be attempted fix vehicles can just last me until summer I can hopefully fix things better by that point.



Just because new posts push up previous posts, i'm waiting on a link to the magic honda funnel that properly fills thru the trans dipstick guide hole so I can order two and prevent this ever happening again hopefully. :p :p
 
Last edited:
I use this one, it fits OVER the fill tube, but it's a tight fit. 2005 Odyssey

Never mind, link didn't work
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top