Like the tittle says, I have a 2005 F350 I recently purchased and I was wondering when do you know she. It's time to rebuild the trans? It's got 199k on it and is all stock. Runs good and shifts fine but Id rather rebuild it before a major failure. Any advice?

 

I've never heard of rebuilding a tranny as preventive maintenance. Run it until it has problems. There are a lot of them with a lot more mileage than yours.

 

Well I wouldn't call it preventative maint. I'd more so say id rather not be towing a load and working and have a failure on the way to a job site and have the truck down when I need it. That's usually how my luck runs. Hahaha

 

Most transmissions fail because of heat. If you don't have gauges already get a scan gauge so you can keep an eye on its temp.

Do regular fluid changes an don't run it if your trans temp get to hi.
If you do those things you should get alot of miles out of it before its time to rebuild it.

 

Yeah I have a scan gauge. I keep a good eye on all my temps when driving/towing. I need to get a hotflush done soon as the last one was done around 160 per previous owner. Should I take it to the dealer for this or any trans shop will do that does exchanging? Thanks for the post guys.

 

You'r past due. I only use the local dealers cause they have the hot flush machine and when they're done I take it home and change the ext. filter. A lot of a/m mechanics don't use the proper fluid. That alone will kill the tranny.

 

If you maintain the transmission and don't put a bad programmer in it will need no replacement. I did 3 years of hard commercial snow plowing and have a sct program on my truck. She shifts great.

 

Yeah the truck has never been tuned or chipped. it's all stock. I will set up an appointment at the dealer then. After I do new hg, studs, delete and blue spring I'm gonna sct tune it and that's about all. Thank you guys for the advice. I couldn't remember if it was supposed to be 30k or 60k. What fluid do they use when exchanging, mercon sp or is it lv? I heard somewhere that LV replaced SP. Am I correct?

 

LV did replace SP, but SP is still available.

 

Ok, This makes me ask why then have I been told by 2 dealerships and one other transmission shop to NOT flush if you have not been doing it all along at regular intervals.
The reason they give it that you will just loosen up crap that will get stuck in new places and make more repairs.
Thanks
Sean

 

I've been told the same thing by a few shops as well. One quit doing it all together. But the census here says to do it. Haha idk what to think sometimes but I do trust the majority of members here.

 

deiselsite has a remote filter:

http://www.dieselsite.com/2003-20076...tersystem.aspx

it works in conjunction with the oem filter. the oem filter
is very fine, and this one filters to 22 micron.

the oem filter operates in bypass mode normally, and filters
only a small amount of the fluid. this unit filters ALL of
the previously unfiltered fluid.

this one will stop chunks out of the tranny, if things go badly,
like you eat a torque converter.

temperature is what kills auto trannies... my trans tem is
usually around 175

i've had zero trans troubles, and figure that with the price of
a trans rebuild, $200 for a filter would be a good investment.

i had mine hot flushed the last time, but when i put on the
filter, i'm gonna just do a drain and refill from now on....
with all the oil being filtered, i don't see the benefit of a
hot flush at that point.

dieselsite has a drain fitting you can add... supposed to
be able to just open the valve and let everything get pumped
out with it idling.

while on the subject, is there something preferable to OEM fluid?

 

I will also do drain-and-refill type flushes from now on ..... mainly because most of the shops around here do not have the hot-flush machines.

 

Nope. I wouldn't trust the other fluid, especially if you have stock components, they tend not to like 3rd party fluids. After my rebuild (due to too many a/m go fast parts), I do have the ability to use cheaper alternatives, but I still use the OEM stuff. I know it works and I figure the extra cost is an investment in the proper running of my vehicle.

 

Two shops that I trust have continued to use SP, even though it costs a little more. I'm sticking with SP as long as I can get it. Even though I don't recall reading of any issues with LV in the TS.