Question w/ draining tranny?

[killermatt]

lol im a noob yes i know but so where all of us.

anyways quick question, do i just undo this bolt and drain the tranny? or is there anything else i need to do? im planing on pulling my tranny and saving me a freaking $85/hour surcharge for R&R

http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h95/killermatt13/IMG_1124.jpg

[MSP #167]

that would be the bolt sir. Just make sure you put some cardboard up against the frame there or else it is gonna shoot fluid everywhere.

[killermatt]

ok thanks alot!
im going to drain it monday.. my fluid i know of never has been changed sence i had it o.o (braindead
its like muddy brown or some shit.. sooo i need to change it and maybe get new parts for my tranny >.>

[Allen]

Question about changing the transmission fluid, is it necessary to replace the filter in the pan? I was going to have a body shop do the work for me so I could prevent creating a mess in my garage, but they said that they would also replace the filter. No one here mentioned about changing the filter for the transmission, so I was wondering if that would be a good idea? Thanks.

[slavrenz]

It's pretty easy to do. Once your oil is drained (which is most of the mess anyway), you just unbolt the pan and pull the filter out. The filter still has some oil in it, so be careful. Push a new filter into place, clean any metal shavings out of the pan, put a new gasket on the pan (with some sealant on both sides to hold it in place), and replace the pan. Use the following tightening torques for everything:

- Drain Plug Bolt: 22-30 ft-lbf
- Pan Bolts: 69.5-95.4 in-lbf (be sure to tighten the bolts evenly)

edit: you can get a filter and gasket kit for less than $20 at any auto parts store. A pretty cheap investment on such an expensive and vital component, IMHO

[Allen]

Awesome, I appreciate the info & instructions. I think that will work for me. Thanks again.

[slavrenz]

Just make sure that you know that I put the pan bolt torques in in-lbf, not ft-lbf. Tightening the bolts in ft-lbf with those numbers will not be good :-)

If you want to do a more thorough "flush" yourself, undo the lower transmission hose that goes to the front oil cooler (in front of the radiator), and run the engine for a few seconds to flush out more of the old oil. I don't remember right now which way everything flows, but that is also not a hard or messy job, if you're careful. You can also add a few quarts of clean tranny oil while you're doing this to create more of a "flushing" effect.

[Allen]

Is the transmission filter not something you can change out? I asked Mazda for a replacement filter and was informed that the car doesn't have one that needs to be swapped out. They recommended me to just flush it and replace the oil, although flushing it essentially means I have to drop the pan to complete the work.

[Tom03es]

^Depends on which transmission you have. If it's a manual, then there is no filter. However, if it's an automatic, there is a "strainer". It's basically a filter and Mazda recommends its replacement every 60,000 miles.

Old on top, new on bottom.
http://www.msprotege.com/members/Tom03es/VB_install_oil_strainer_compare.JPG

[Prodigy]

It's an auto^

You won't be changing the fluid in the torque converter if you're just draining it.
You'll need a fluid extractor if you want all of the ATF filtered/swapped.