Hey all,

A friend of mine wants me to do some work on his car prior to sale.
It is a 2001 Accord 4cyl auto, it has roughly 130k miles. It has minor mechanical issues, I can handle them but the car was not able to pass state annual inspection due to the presence of DTC P0740. Check engine light is currently not illuminated, I assume the code is stored as pending code. (Haven't checked with my scanner.)

After few hours of research, P0740 can be triggered by
#1) Faulty solenoid assy.
#2) Old transmission fluid/incorrect type of fluid, or both.
#3) Clogged filter, both solenoid filter and AT filter.

Third possibility was brought to my attention after watching this video;
And further research showed that replacing filter(OE, aftermarket) solved the issue. I'm guessing the old filter interrupted the fluid flow, caused insufficient fluid pressure and eventually triggered P0740.

6th gen Accord doesn't seem to have such filter, but it does have some sort of screen filter on the bottom of lock-up solenoid assembly. It shouldn't be too much trouble to inspect the solenoid filter, but do you think replacing filter could solve this problem? Solenoid assembly(Honda genuine) costs around $170 on ebay, price of filter is only $17. Or should I just replace whole assembly to eliminate #1 and #3? Might as well replace AT filter and fluid.


I understand that there's no easy fix when it comes to transmission, but since he's trying to minimize the cost of repair, I'd like to find the most affordable way to fix this issue.

Thanks in advance!