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fluid change or flush??


douellette

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i think its getting time to change my tranny fluid again. the car has 160k miles on it, and it appears to have been changed before because it looks fairly clean and dosnt smell bad. but should bring it to a dealership and have them flush it? or just drop the pan and change the filter and refill it myself? you'd think flushing would be better but idk.

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FLUSH? no.

 

 

Do a pan drop and change the filter, only. and get a good filter, like WIX, and if you car has a reusable gasket, reuse it. If you can suck the fluid out of the tranny before hand it make much less mess, I bought a suction pump to do that.

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If you can suck the fluid out of the tranny before hand it make much less mess, I bought a suction pump to do that.

 

X12345678 on that shit. a full pan of fluid with no drain plug is a bitch to not get everywhere when it comes off...

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If you have the time and don't feel like spending $90+ on an old car, just change it yourself for ~$40. If you jack your car up a bit in the front and be patient, a lot of the fluid will drain out before you drop the pan. It's not the most fun in the world, but I did far harder things on my car. Also, lay down some garbage bags to catch any spilled fluid. Makes for an easy cleanup.

 

I owned my W body for 5 years, and changed the fluid around every 10-15k miles. Of everything that ever broke on it, I never once had a problem with the 19 year old transmission with 153k miles. Best of luck :high5:

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every 10-15k miles??? Wow. At what intervals are you actually supposed to change it?

 

30-50k is the right interval. My torque converter never worked, so the fluid burnt up pretty quickly. I'm not saying everyone else should do it at that interval, but that's about when my fluid turned black

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Man, I've driven almost 60k without flushing the transmission since it was rebuilt. Perhaps I should get it flushed huh...

 

Is there a way to tell if it needs to be flushed?

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Well I guess that answers my question. The transmission cooler helps keep the oil from burning, and it still looks perfectly red and clear after 60k, so I think i'll check back on it when I hit 250k on the dash.

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  • 2 weeks later...

WOW.

 

I changed my transmission fluid yesterday. Didn't flush it, just change it. Apparently you don't realize how brown it is till its flowing out of a pipe.

 

I bought a manual siphon pump from a Pep Boys and pumped out all the transmission fluid through a rubber hose and into an old coolant bottle. I was able to draw more than a gallon, but I only had a new gallon to put back in, so my dipstick reads half way now.

 

Took all of 20 minutes to do it by sucking it up through the dipstick tube. Easy as hell. Shifts MUCH smoother now. I was pretty surprised at the difference it made. Apparently the fluid really can go only 60k miles.

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Yeah, 60K is pushing it on DM3 fluid.. Realistically, the flush interval is 60K the first time (from a brand new car) and then 30K from then on..

 

I just flushed mine at 50K on the new trans (bought to car that way) and used Dexron6 fluid.. Holds up a bit better, but should still be flushed every 30K

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^ way to go cheap and not get a new filter...

 

old filter + new fluid isn't that great of a combo...

 

I would have done it all, if I had the time. I still have a Jaguar that I need to get running by the 16th of this month. Not that much time considering I just barely dropped the engine in.

 

Didn't have to get a new oil pan gasket, or filter, or make a mess. I think I'll be fine considering the transmission was rebuilt 61k miles ago.

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