How often do you change your manual transmission fluid?

[Peakster]

So overall, if my MT fluid is a dark soupy gray, I should change it? Maybe I'll take Danronian's advice and do it myself (I need to find a service manual fo my car).

[Gary Palmer]

That is what I would recommend. Their is most likely a drain plug, and a fill plug on the transmission. They come out similar to the engine oil drain. The bottom one is the drain, the top one is the fill. Just refill it till it starts to come out the top hole, then put the plug back in. For oil, check the manufactere's recommendation.

[ffvben]

most cars I service - 30k for auto trans fluid. on some of these 4x4s i change the transfercase fluid also(same as a manual trans-its just gears inside) and I notice the dexron fluid color is darker than new fluid and if I change it around 50k the fluid in the transfercase is usually black. they are very easy to change the fluid. make sure you can get the fill plug out FIRST or you might have a hard time filling it up from the drain plug. I've seen one manual trans where the fill plug was corroded and would not come out, it took a lot of time to get that plug out using the fire wrench/hammer/chisel. so in my opinion 40-50k would be good for dexron fluid exchange . some transmissions use 80-90w( usually for heavy duty trucks)

[psyshack]

I change transmission fluid every third oil change. Be it AT or MT. So that would be around every 30k miles.

[rh77]

Originally Posted by psyshack

I change transmission fluid every third oil change. Be it AT or MT. So that would be around every 30k miles.

Wow, that's pretty rigorous -- do you do a complete flush, or drain as much as you can? Also, do you run synthetic? I need to do my 80,000 mile AT fluid change ...

RH77

[psyshack]

Originally Posted by rh77

Wow, that's pretty rigorous -- do you do a complete flush, or drain as much as you can? Also, do you run synthetic? I need to do my 80,000 mile AT fluid change ...

RH77

I did a complete flush on the Accord when it was new. That was 12 qts. of M1 ATF. Got the Honda ATF stuff out fast. Tranny temps came down and the car shifts a tad firmer. Normal drain and fill is 3 qts. The filter is a side stream affair that looks a lot like a fuel filter.

My Mt's I do the same way. get the OEM stuff out fast and get what I want in there. With the Mazda3 I refilled it with M1 75-95 gear oil. Didi it again at the 5k mile oil change. So its now on its 30k mile service.

The Ranger the same treatment. It runs M1 ATF.

The Accord is a partial drain and fill. The MT's are complete drain and fill.

[guest001]

Originally Posted by Peakster

I drove to Wal-Mart today seeking my usual $24.71 Tech 2000 oil change for the Geo, only to be informed it was going to be a 3 hour wait (which was weird because it was after 3pm and the auto service department closes at 5pm).

I ended up going to one of those 'drop in' oil change places and paid nearly $41 for the base 5W30 oil change. Everything under the hood was inspected fine, except for my manual transmission fluid which looked like a dark grey soup. The oil change person said it would be $49.99 to change it, but I declined simply because I didn't want to spend the money today.

Is there places that can do this manual transmission fluid change for cheap (Wal-Mart has always put N/A next to trnsmission fluid check)? How important is it for this fluid to be changed?

suriously you should change your own oil. it's about $10 or less to do it yourself. depends if you can find really good deals on oil and filters. they just had 8.99 for 5 quarts and a filter at autozone.

[8307c4]

No, you won't find a manual transmission fluid change for much below 50, the good news is it only needs to be done every 50-80k miles or so, and of course from what you're saying you really do need to do it lol

Yes I am sure, every 40,000 at the absolute most, more than likely 50-80 thousand miles in between. The thing is nobody ever does it, that's really the problem in a nutshell so likely once you do it this one time you probably sell the car before it needs it again, idk.

Good luck

[VetteOwner]

wait ur fluid is grey? id be lookin to get it changed soon, it gets grey from small chunks of metal

[Peakster]

Originally Posted by guest001

suriously you should change your own oil.

I know that changing my own oil is the most economical way of going about it. Unfortunately, I'm not too interested in being under my car while in my dormitory parking lot along -25*C weather .