2020 Acura TLX Reliability Report

Two patterns stand out. The transmission shifts harshly or late, refuses to upshift, or drops into neutral while driving and stays there until the car is restarted. Separately, the engine loses all power without warning, often with rod knocking blamed on a failing connecting rod bearing. One owner reports a second rod failure after the engine was rebuilt. Sudden shutdowns when pulling away from a stop raise the risk of a crash in traffic. Other reports describe AWD cutting out alongside emissions and parking brake messages.

The auto idle stop shuts the engine off at a light and then fails to restart it, leaving the car stuck in traffic. Some cars drop into neutral, and restarting can take more than a minute. Other complaints describe electric parking brake and emissions system warnings, flickering, and a string of driver-assist faults. One of those reports also mentions sudden automatic braking with nothing ahead. A separate report describes a front tire coming off at 65 mph shortly after dealer recall work.

These complaints are mixed. Some describe hesitation, jerking, and sudden stalls in traffic, followed by driver-assist warnings, including one case right after recall engine work. Another reports the car accelerating on its own at parking-lot speed. One owner reports a completed recall still showing as unrepaired in federal records, which blocked a required inspection certificate. One crash report gives no details. Dealers sometimes decline to act when they cannot reproduce the problem.

The front camera fails, taking adaptive cruise control, lane keeping, automatic braking, and auto high beams down with it. One owner puts the camera repair near $2000. The collision mitigation braking system also activates hard for no reason, which risks a rear-end hit. Some cars show a cluster of collision, lane-keep, brake, and cruise warnings at once, and in one case the car stalled and then would not go above 20 mph.

Rotors warp early, around 15k miles, while the pads still have plenty of life. At highway speed this can mean pumping the brakes during a sudden stop. A second problem is the electric parking brake engaging on its own while driving, braking the car without warning in highway traffic. That report includes a parking brake malfunction alarm that stays on after a restart and an emissions warning that flashes on and off.

A front wheel comes off while driving, with no warning beyond a feeling that a tire was going flat. That happened at about 830 miles, and the dealer suggested tampering. The other complaint is mostly about waiting roughly two years for recall parts, with dealers saying a failure has to happen first. That owner also reports stalling, slow restarts after auto stop, and cracking noises while driving.

Few complaints exist here, but one is serious. In a rear-end collision that pushed the car into the vehicle ahead, the air bags did not deploy, and the driver needed emergency-room care for arm and back injuries. The car was not inspected afterward, so the cause is unknown. The other complaint concerns a repair that dealers at two locations could not complete because they had no parts.