Automatic Transmission Service

Hey guys, this is my first post.
I have a 2006 Tacoma auto V6 and it has never had the transmission serviced. I am at 132xxx miles and I am wondering if at this point a transmission service would shorten or prolong the life of my transmission. Any thoughts?
Thanks.

 

How would it shorten the life?

Maybe drain the 3 quarts from the pan and see how it looks. My 2010 has 130k and I’ve never serviced the tranny but it’s on my list of things to do!

 

Service never hurts the life of a part.

I would do a pan drop and flush. I’m not a big fan of the drain and refill since you can never really get all the fluid out without dropping the pan.
Mixing putrid fluid with new fluid can cause the milkshake issue.
Many people do the self fluid drain and refill without issue however.

At over 100k I would have a trans shop do a full blown flush.

 

If you are not maintaining your transmission properly then you probably not doing other maintenance as you should do either. It will catch up to you when you are broke down on the side of the road and you have a huge repair bill. Just take the truck in somewhere and have the tranny serviced and any other service that you are over due for.

 

Don't change the fluid.

It doesn't shorten the life, but if there is any damage already done keeping the old fluid in there will buy time and keep it running for a year or 2 more. Changing the fluid at this point won't help anything. If there is no damage, there is no damage, and the original fluid is good for the life of the transmission. If there is damage it will fail sooner with fresh fluid.

 

It's not difficult to do a pan drop, filter clean and full flush.

Read this thread:

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/diy-full-flush-for-automatic-transmission.68462/

 

No

 

That is incorrect. Lifetime fluid means no change for the life of the fluid not the life of the vehicle.
Fluids will always breakdown depending on use. The higher temps you run on your trans (ie more hauling and towing) the faster the fluid starts to experience changes from breakdown.

It is correct to say a failing transmission may fail faster with fluid changes but you cannot say that it will be 1-2 years. It could be 5 years or 2 weeks time difference.

Doing a trans service will not cause a failure that wasn’t already going to exist... but this likely does not apply to the OP. He’s got relatively low miles on his truck.

 

I dont know other person. Father in law had 400K miles on his Taco and never changed the fluid and never had issues. Other guys change their fluid religiously.

I have heard of there being issues when changing fluid after a certain amount of miles, but I am not sure if that applies to modern cars.

 

IMO don't worry about it and do it.
I did 4 drain and fills (and pan drop with filter change) on a '11 Camry with 168,000 miles and no transmission service ever. Old fluid had zero transmission fluid smell and was really nasty looking. This actually brought it back to normal shifting.
I did 2 drain and fills on a '03 Tacoma with 191,000 miles and no transmission service recorded. The fluid came out looking like mud with zero good smell. The owner (son) says he can't even feel it shift anymore. My guess it jerked and slammed into gear really bad before like the Camry.
Both times I added Lubegard at 1 ounce per quart at the last fill.
Toyota vehicles must have really tough automatic transmissions!
BTW, I just did an oil change on the Camry at 192K miles and it is still shifting ok. The Tacoma is doing good too or else mommy would be bitching at me.

 

don't worry, im at 196k miles and never changed it but also don't do heavy towing

 

Well as far as the accusation of not maintaining my vehicle: I maintain my vehicles very well but I recently got this truck and I am certain it’s never had a transmission service. And as far as your keyboard warrior skills are concerned: I don’t appreciate them but maybe someone else does.

 

To Do or not to DO - that is the question

 

A little touchy there. Based on your question it appeared you aren’t very savvy regarding maintenance. If a person is tens of thousands of miles over due for scheduled maintenance you shouldn’t need to ask if it should be done, you just get er done. Have you done other maintenance on the truck? If so then why wouldn’t you just do the tranny maintenance to? Had you provided a little more information and indicated that you just recently got the truck I wouldn’t have responded as I did. Didn’t mean to offend you.

 

Depends on who you ask about the transmission service, a lot of the toyota dealers will tell you the transmission system is sealed and you dont change the fluid in them, ive been told that from the dealer before, maybe the op thought he might get some valuable information from expierenced yota owners here insteads of useless smart ass answer.

 

I've got 106k on mine and have had the tranny oil changed twice, at 50 and at 100, because i was hauling a lot of weight in th back of the truck over some long distances and on both occasions I 'felt' that it changed a lot smoother. The dealer suxs out the old fluid and puts in the new fluid at the same time, that way you get a full change. I take it to the dealer as there is no dipstick and I don't have a scan tool to check the level if I did it myself. This is just what I do to keep up with my maintenance

 

There is no such thing as lifetime tranny fluid. It doesn’t matter if a tranny is sealed or not. If you don’t change the fluid, it at least needs to be inspected. Especially in the op’s case since he doesn’t know what kind of use the truck had previously. If it was used in extreme conditions like towing, off road, driving in summer desert temps. , a lot of mountainous driving etc. the fluid may likely have gone beyond its life expectancy. I believe Toyota calls for replacement at 100000 miles. It should be changed at 100000. The very least the fluid should be inspected. If you just wait and see what happens you may not like what happens.

 

i would just do a drain and fill, then drive it a little bit, drain and fill again... catch what you drain and add what came out back... that'll get some new fluid in the system. shouldnt hurt a thing

been a while since ive done a transmission service on a taco. but i think 3.5 -4 quarts usually comes out

 

Idk about you but when I bought mine used at 99k I also paid for the warranty they use to bend you over. The one where if you don’t provide proof of routine maintenance, they won’t cover the cost of any repairs? So I have receipts for everything in the maintenance schedule, including the “Inspection of automatic transmission fluid”. So as much as I hate dealing with repairs and would love to avoid an issue or a breakdown, I did what I’m “required” to do according to the folks that sold me and service my vehicle. My case is a little unique though, not many people are dumb enough to finance those absurd warranties.