I will be having my new Redhead steering box installed soon and have decided to replace the high pressure hoses and go with synthetic fluid. I was told today at my NAPA store that all ATF / Mercon V is synthetic. Why then does Valvoline ( who manufactures all of NAPA oil and fluids) label some as full synthetic and others with no such designation? Also the "full synthetic" that they carry is labeled Mercon LV? Is this backward compatible with the regular Mercon V or made specially for the newer vehicles listed on the bottle?
Thanks, Mike

 

MERCON V's debut was 2008. It replaced MERCON, MERCON-ATF, DEXRON III, and TYPE-F. There is nothing Backwards Compatible with MERCON V. At least not yet. However, MERCON V is Backwards compatible with MERCON, MERCON-ATF, DEXRON III, and TYPE-F

Check this out: - Bob is the Oil Guy - Bob is the Oil Guy

The classifications of oils is: Semi-Synthetic and Full Synthetic

Prior to MERCON V there were Power Steering Fluids and Transmission Fluids which were not compatible, i.e.: MERCON-ATF, DEXRON III, and TYPE-F

As I understand it, MERCON V brings it all together into one lubricant for both Transmission and Power Steering. It was discontinued in Transfer Cases in 2012 and replaced with XL-12 designed for one specific use.

Tom

 

Synthetic in laymen terms is merely man made, lab based. Dino oil is from the earth. MerconV is just that. I would not use any other fluid in place.

Cheapest I found was Walmart Supertech at $4.27 a qt back in May.

 

Thanks for the replies. Did some research and the Mercon LV can not be used where MerconV is called for.

 

The LV is used in the 5R110 trans with the 6.0 crowd.

 

Here are the Fluid Application Charts

 

That is a nice chart for gassers, our trucks are not listed. You got one that covers our trucks?

 

This isn't a bad one either...

 

That was the one I was looking for!

Some day soon I am going to have to go through my remote access server. I've got just under a TB (probably 500GB on Ford Alone). I've let it morph into a trash repository. Time to start adding folders and indexing files.

Tom