hello all

i have been meaning to ask this question for a while i have a 2000 v10 and during this past summer i was towing a small 4x8 trailer and it was realllllly hot out in upstate new york some of the hills are a little steep and tranny shufts alot but my problem was that it started to leak tranny fluid from up top of the tranny went to local dealer they said that the tranny was over full (that was a croc of sh**) i know that the tranny was not over full i had just checked it a few days before and it was fine they drained it and it has not leaked but the problem is that it had never leaked before this and still does not leak so any replies would be great

 

It probally was over filled

 

Not to be a sad-sack or anything, but people here say once the tranny starts spitting fluid when it gets hot, the tranny is toast and needs a rebuild.

Could have been overfull, or got hot enough to expand the fluid and pushed out the breather...

 

My guess would be the tranny got hot and pushed fluid out.

 

tranny seems to shift perfect and has not leaked in over 6 months and it stays full

 

900, you gotta remember, our trannies hold over 17qts. That's a lot of fluid that will take up a lot more room when it's heated up during towing. It's real easy to overfill them because it takes a lot of miles to get the fluid hot enough to properly check the level. You might have just been a bit overfilled like the dealership said.

 

To properly check the fluids you must have the vehicle very level the long length of the motor pan and tranny pan can cause you to be significantly over full if nose up or under full if nose down and it does NOT have to be many degrees off level for this to happen.....

if it is not leaking I bet it was over full

I have to ask, since you are so adamant about it, after they drained some fluid out did you personally check the fluid level at full operating temp and motor in park with motor at idle speed?..... If it was NOT over full as you stated, then it should be low on fluid now......

 

Upstate NY hot? + small 4x8 trailer = Fluid out the top = overfilled transmission

I had fluid blow out the top vent once on a freshly-rebuilt E4OD in a '97 F250. But I had towed a 10,000 lb RV to the lake and was backing it into a spot before it spewed. Oh, and the temp was about 100 that day. Tranny had been over-filled (I knew it was a little over-full) Once the extra juice was out, it never "leaked" again.

Have pulled same trailer under same (or hotter) conditions with a few Super Duty trucks and have never had a "leak".

 

A couple of weeks ago I pulled a 4500lb. load a total of 45 miles in 80 degree weather, never exceeding 55 mph, and the transmission overflowed. Of course I was surprised and alarmed. When I checked the level it was a bit over full. No wonder it overflowed, but, and that's the important word here, but I had towed much heavier loads in much higher temps with the same oil in the transmission. Why was this day different? Just a few days ago one of my sons changed the fluid and filter for me. It needed to be done and the magnet in the pan had caught a scary collection of metal particles, but the bottom line is that the filter was not clogged to the extent that it could have caused the overflow. I'm still scratching my head but the transmission works like a charm and always has. Never a slip or a missed shift, even when oil was pouring out and smoking on the exhaust pipe. Now I wonder am I safe to tow my camper weighing in at 8000 lbs?

 

I'd hookup a temp gauge to the tranny PRONTO and watch it for a while.

Mine never gets above 150 degrees, but I don't tow much.

 

Bought my 01 F250 4x4, 3.73's with 88,000 miles recently, then loaded a slide-in camper and went to Death Valley. While climbing from the -200 to 5000 feet we started smelling something and suddenly noticed lots of smoke coming out the back. Pulled over immediately, shut it down, once all the smoke cleared I saw the undercarriage covered with tranny fluid and the long trail of fluid on the road we just came up. Not a good place for ANYTHING to go wrong. Minimum of $1000 just to get towed to Lone Pine and then at their mercy. BUT, before it got that far, we got lucky and a car came by (just one) and they were kind enough to fetch all the Mercron tranny fluid they could buy in the valley (3 quarts). I poured those in, which brought it back to good, turned the rig around and coasted back to the valley floor (talk about some hot brakes). Stopped and checked several times on the way down to make sure we were not blowing it all out. After much debate the next morning, I decided to try and make it out to Ridgecrest, Ca hoping for better repair options. I had trans temp gauge on my previous powerstroke and remembered the best way to keep the temp low when towing is the keep the engine revving high. While still cool in the morning, with the rpm higher than I would normally run we made it out of the valley and over the 5000 foot pass, and from there it was mostly easy going to Ridgecrest. We kept a close eye on things and only had a slow drip pretty much all the way out. We were lucky, stopped at a Napa, they recommenced a GREAT mechanic. He knew in an instant that the trans seal had given-up. $12.95 for the seal, another $12.00 for the rear main seal since we were in there and about $450 labor to get to them (4x4). He said he has seen quite a few fail and that we were lucky to have caught before the fluid got too low and fried the tranny.
Had it happened 1/2 later, it would have been dark outside and I might not have seen the smoke until it was too late.

 

Update to my transmission leaking issue:

My son wanted to borrow my truck to pull a boat a few weeks back. I told him that would be fine, but I needed to change the oil in the transmission, and the filter, and the engine oil, but if he wanted to do that for me he could use the truck. Devious, I know, but it worked. It is, by the way, the easiest transmission oil change he's ever done, and the easiest I've ever watched. We towed the boat he wanted to tow with no issue, but it was a fairly small boat. Last week though I put it to the test. I pulled a boat that would weigh in around 9000 lbs. and had no issue. The weather was a balmy high 70's and I towed at highway speeds around 50 miles. I'm not sure if it was the level of fluid in the transmission or the filter, but I can't argue with success. Either way it proves to me that it wasn't just a leaky seal or a failing transmission.