2009 Crew Cab short box Harley Edition F-350. 6.4L 195,000km (122K mi)

It's a buddies truck. He got home after a ½ hour drive and the transmission was leaking fluid. Lots of it. When he parked it in the drive it worked perfectly fine, didn't notice anything.

So he takes it to the Ford dealer and they say it's the front transmission (pump) seal.

Anyway, because of some trust issues and pricing, he decided that I should take over the project of removing transmission and replacing the seal.

As we speak, I have made preparations to remove the transmission. I removed the rear line from the transmission and the fluid that dripped out didn't look quite right...so I looked closer and it was distinctly green antifreeze.

I then checked the coolant level...the Degas bottle is empty.

The only place the coolant and trans fluid could mix is in a bad radiator. Am I right?

Now if I were to replace the rad, flush the transmission, refill it with coolant, would it be ready to go? Or would I still need to replace the seal?

I'm guessing that with the fluid coming up way to high, simply replacing the rad would do.

What's your thoughts?

 

Yes, that's a bad radiator. It's also probably a destroyed transmission. Engine coolant dissolves the glue that holds the friction material in place. A total failure is immenent.

 

Well I talked to buddy and he says the truck did leak antifreeze at times and so perhaps the coolant did not all go into the transmission. How could I test the rad?

 

Thanks for the quick response!

Is there any "best" way to go about to avoid the transmission failure?

After a conversation with an other mechanic friend I will proceed to change the transmission seal. It shouldn't leak even though the fluid levels comes high.

Which, upon removal of the transmission dipstick, is not even the case. It's too low to touch the dipstick.

 

If there is coolant in the transmission, it's not worth replacing a seal without the whole transmission around it being replaced. It will fail really soon.

 

Is a transmission from a 2003 F-350 6.0L diesel the same as the 2009 F-350 6.4L?

 

Yes they can be done, but you have to match the flywheel and torque converter together. 6.0's have 6 lugs, 8 on 6.4's. So you would need to use a 6.4 converter in the 6.0 trans. It would be a downgrade too as there are improvements to the 6.4 version, albeit minor.

If you remove the flywheel from the 6.4 make sure you mark it for alignment, although you might know that from working on yours already...

 

Well I thought I might dig up this thread again for a little update. It's been a few months now and buddy is still driving his 6.4L with the transmission that was antifreezed.

He hit a deer with it and had to repair his charged air cooler. The bumper remains bent for the time being but he drives it!