Hi all. Been a member on this forum for a while now. First joined when we bought a 2007 TL for my wife. A few years ago I traded in my 1998 Honda Prelude Type-SH for a 2006 RL Tech. I was a very active member in the 2G RL forum over the last few years. The RL was a great car but it was hit by an 18-wheeler, (parked with nobody in the car), and ended up being totaled.
Yesterday I picked up a 2012 TL SH-AWD with tech package from Courtesy Acura. I'm not going to go into lengthy comparisons between the RL and TL. I know many members here previously owned a 2G RL and already know that the RL to TL switch is a give and take. Overall, I'm happy with the car. It's 6 years new than my outgoing RL and is actually costing me $30/month less in car payments. I really wanted a 6-speed manual but they are pretty hard to find and I had a small window with a paid for rental car to get another vehicle.
I haven't really mapped out a plan for modding yet. I will be doing a lot more to this vehicle than I did to the RL since mods cost about half the price. I did manage to salvage all of my V-LED interior LED bulbs as well as the 3000LM LED DRL kit from the RL that I will install on the TL. I also kept the 20" TSW Jerez wheels from the RL and will be installing them next spring. 20% window tint will be coming in the next couple of weeks as well as new set of winter tires, (probably Hankook W-310's). Other than that, future plans include: roof wing, 5k HID foglight kit, Comptech Icebox, J-Pipe, exhaust and Tein coilovers. I'm undecided on whether or not the OEM lip kit is worth the money.
This build will be somewhat slow as I don't have money growing on a tree in my backyard and I tend to spend a little extra to get higher quality components. I'm just getting into researching on this forum. If there are any absolutely must-have mods, please feel free to let me know.
Anyway, here are a couple iPhone pictures I took of the new car:
![Click the image to open in full size.]()
![Click the image to open in full size.]()
Here's the RL I'm coming from and what it looked like after getting crushed by an 18-wheeler:
![Click the image to open in full size.]()
![Click the image to open in full size.]()
![Click the image to open in full size.]()
![Click the image to open in full size.]()
Yesterday I picked up a 2012 TL SH-AWD with tech package from Courtesy Acura. I'm not going to go into lengthy comparisons between the RL and TL. I know many members here previously owned a 2G RL and already know that the RL to TL switch is a give and take. Overall, I'm happy with the car. It's 6 years new than my outgoing RL and is actually costing me $30/month less in car payments. I really wanted a 6-speed manual but they are pretty hard to find and I had a small window with a paid for rental car to get another vehicle.
I haven't really mapped out a plan for modding yet. I will be doing a lot more to this vehicle than I did to the RL since mods cost about half the price. I did manage to salvage all of my V-LED interior LED bulbs as well as the 3000LM LED DRL kit from the RL that I will install on the TL. I also kept the 20" TSW Jerez wheels from the RL and will be installing them next spring. 20% window tint will be coming in the next couple of weeks as well as new set of winter tires, (probably Hankook W-310's). Other than that, future plans include: roof wing, 5k HID foglight kit, Comptech Icebox, J-Pipe, exhaust and Tein coilovers. I'm undecided on whether or not the OEM lip kit is worth the money.
This build will be somewhat slow as I don't have money growing on a tree in my backyard and I tend to spend a little extra to get higher quality components. I'm just getting into researching on this forum. If there are any absolutely must-have mods, please feel free to let me know.
Anyway, here are a couple iPhone pictures I took of the new car:
Here's the RL I'm coming from and what it looked like after getting crushed by an 18-wheeler:
