Its been 40K miles since I purchased my car and rebuilt the trans. At the time of the install I switched to Mercon 5 and got the 3200 stall T/C. That was 2 years ago and roughly about 30k was put on the trans/fluid since the rebuild.
I installed aftermarket gauges, a cooler and a tow hitch. Lately when towing I noticed the temp would climb to 180ish and my fluid was starting to get dark. Also, as you've probably noticed, my trans pan gasket was leaking so I decided to get a deep alluminum pan and perform a trans flush and filter change.
I purchased my pan off eJay from "Brenspeed" and it was $127 shipped. Its a MAC brand, alluminum and added an extra 3.5-4 qts of fluid and includes a handy drain plug. It also came with the necessary bolts(a tad longer would have been nice) and a good gasket, NOT made of qork. Got some M5 from the dealer(shop cost/$45 for 18 qts) and took my car up to my old work to borrow the rack and have some fun.
After working at a trans shop for years I learned how to drain the fluids without getting all messy everytime. I leave the back two bolts tight and remove all the others, this will slowly drain the fluid. Than I remove one of the back two slowly with my air gun and this drains more. Finally I remove the last one slowly while holding the pan with my hand stopping before the bolt is completely out. After the last of the fluid drains from the hanging pan, I push it up tight against the trans and remove the last bolt completely and use the hose attached to the air gun to lower the gun to the ground. I than grab the pan with both hands carefull not to dump the rest of the fluid out.
I usually leave a tiny bit of fluid in the pan to look for debris and to keep any heavy loose particles in there and attached to the magnet so I can inspect. We call this a "pan drop" in the business.
Next I installed a 4X4 filter which has the extra long pick-up tube, which isn't necessary, just helps incase I run low on fluid or if I'm drifting or something, lol.
Next I tried to clean the area as best as possible(the shop NEVER has brake cleaner damn it!) and installed the Mac pan and supplied gasket.
This shows the ground clearance issue that I was desperately worried about!
Next step was to perform a complete flush of the system. I installed the BG flush machine in-line on the trans cooler lines. Its pretty sweet....just install the hoses in ANY order, fill it up and let the car run to swap the dirty fluid for clean fluid WITHOUT mixing them. 99% fluid exchange without damaging the trans by "flushing" the system because is uses the transmission line pressure.
After I hooked up the machine, I lowered my car and added 6 qts of "grade B" ATF(lol, used fluid), started it and re-checked the system. Nothing on the stick, as I figured. Added another quart, nothing, added another...still nothing, haha. Added 1/2 a quart and it filled it to the bottom of the cold line. The standard trans service will change exactly 5 qts on these so I got an extra 3.5 qts into the system...sweet
Once I got the "dirty" system full I switch the machine to Process and let the car run. Here is a picture of my dirty fluid and the line pressure of the trans at idle...not too shabby.
The flush took about 7 minutes to perform...look at my fluid now! :eek-large:
Soooo perty, lol. Anyways....my trans doesn't hit 130* when I'm driving around town and its been close to 90* a couple days. Haven't towed yet but I imagine it will be back to normal plus some......
On a side note...remember that motor mount I changed when I installed my headers? Check this BS out.....
:mad-tilt::mad-tilt:
:mad-tilt::mad-tilt:
I installed aftermarket gauges, a cooler and a tow hitch. Lately when towing I noticed the temp would climb to 180ish and my fluid was starting to get dark. Also, as you've probably noticed, my trans pan gasket was leaking so I decided to get a deep alluminum pan and perform a trans flush and filter change.
I purchased my pan off eJay from "Brenspeed" and it was $127 shipped. Its a MAC brand, alluminum and added an extra 3.5-4 qts of fluid and includes a handy drain plug. It also came with the necessary bolts(a tad longer would have been nice) and a good gasket, NOT made of qork. Got some M5 from the dealer(shop cost/$45 for 18 qts) and took my car up to my old work to borrow the rack and have some fun.
After working at a trans shop for years I learned how to drain the fluids without getting all messy everytime. I leave the back two bolts tight and remove all the others, this will slowly drain the fluid. Than I remove one of the back two slowly with my air gun and this drains more. Finally I remove the last one slowly while holding the pan with my hand stopping before the bolt is completely out. After the last of the fluid drains from the hanging pan, I push it up tight against the trans and remove the last bolt completely and use the hose attached to the air gun to lower the gun to the ground. I than grab the pan with both hands carefull not to dump the rest of the fluid out.
I usually leave a tiny bit of fluid in the pan to look for debris and to keep any heavy loose particles in there and attached to the magnet so I can inspect. We call this a "pan drop" in the business.
Next I installed a 4X4 filter which has the extra long pick-up tube, which isn't necessary, just helps incase I run low on fluid or if I'm drifting or something, lol.
Next I tried to clean the area as best as possible(the shop NEVER has brake cleaner damn it!) and installed the Mac pan and supplied gasket.
This shows the ground clearance issue that I was desperately worried about!
Next step was to perform a complete flush of the system. I installed the BG flush machine in-line on the trans cooler lines. Its pretty sweet....just install the hoses in ANY order, fill it up and let the car run to swap the dirty fluid for clean fluid WITHOUT mixing them. 99% fluid exchange without damaging the trans by "flushing" the system because is uses the transmission line pressure.
After I hooked up the machine, I lowered my car and added 6 qts of "grade B" ATF(lol, used fluid), started it and re-checked the system. Nothing on the stick, as I figured. Added another quart, nothing, added another...still nothing, haha. Added 1/2 a quart and it filled it to the bottom of the cold line. The standard trans service will change exactly 5 qts on these so I got an extra 3.5 qts into the system...sweet
Once I got the "dirty" system full I switch the machine to Process and let the car run. Here is a picture of my dirty fluid and the line pressure of the trans at idle...not too shabby.
The flush took about 7 minutes to perform...look at my fluid now! :eek-large:
Soooo perty, lol. Anyways....my trans doesn't hit 130* when I'm driving around town and its been close to 90* a couple days. Haven't towed yet but I imagine it will be back to normal plus some......
On a side note...remember that motor mount I changed when I installed my headers? Check this BS out.....
:mad-tilt::mad-tilt:
