za3879

When I go to get an oil change - the punk always tells me that i need a tranny flush/change.
he shows me the oil and tries to tell me its all black n funked out. It looks nice and clear to me.
My ES now is hitting 80k on it. Is it a good time to do it anyway? What should i pay for such a service?
I'm not sure i see a need for it, but I guess i'm down for any maintenance that is necessary to
keep things goin smooth.

any comments/suggestions?

z

PERRYinLA

Those "punks" at quickie-lubes get a kickback for any extra services they sell, so you are likely to get such a pitch whether you need it or not. It is a very profitable service- charging $60-80 or more and costing them only the ATF they use. I've even seen them "flush" by opening the drain plug, and as the old ATF drains out, they add fresh ATF through the dip stick as the engine is running. That is a very inefficient and ineffective techinque, to say the least, but it saves them the trouble of hooking up your trans cooler lines to a ATF flush machine and doing it properly.

I'm more familiar with the SC, but if your ES has a drain plug on the trans pan, you can refresh some of the ATF yourself by draining a few quarts and adding the same amount of fresh ATF through the dip stick. That would cost a lot less, and after a few iterations every 20K or 30K miles, you'll have effectively changed most of your ATF. I'm sure there are some posts on this issue in the ES forum if you search a bit.

RTIS250

iTrader: (9)

there is also a drain plug on the "differential" of the transmission. Both hold ATF, and both can be drained. When refilling it usually takes ~4 quarts of so.

damon

I had a flush done on my 94 LS at a Toyota dealership. They used a BG flush machine.

Jason Pham of JP Importz told me the other day that the Lexus dealership where he had been previously

employed , stopped offering the flush option when some problems apparently from this process came up.

I do not know if this is Lexus Policy or not.

damon

Since I now know that my Trans fluid is in good shape, I will follow a strict regimen of drain & fill.

sweetsc400

I've heard the same thing about flushes. Supposedly it can dislodge particle build-up causing it to jam in important areas causing damage further down the road. Did you have problems with your 94LS after the flush? Did it improve shift quality? Did you get your screen/filter changed?

damon

I had purchased this 94 used so I had no idea what condition the fluids were in or how often they had been changed. I therefore went with the more extreme flush option.

I followed BG directions & bought a can of the "Quick Clean" pre-flush conditioner which is supposed to remove accumulated deposits from the valve body, filter screen & other components.

The Toyota dealer assured me the machine was loaded up with T-IV fluid & away they went. Cost was about $85.00 or so.

I have had no problems whatsoever & now have some piece of mind. Did not notice much if any change in the smoothness of the tranny.

I will now get on a routine of drain & fill.

damon

BTW: A similar BG flush machine did wonders for my Power Steering pump!

toy4two

Toyota claims never need to change tranny fluid, the new models even removed the tranny dip stick. So if the king of reliability says better not to ever change it, I sure as hell wouldn't flush it.

damon

If you follow the above method on a paddle shift GS400 that has been driven hard ( most are!) the "King of Reliability" will take a huge hunk of your wallet !!!

damon