burny

Nice work. Did you have a helper on the top off procedure or did you go at it alone? did you get all 11-12 quarts out or just a few?

gr8fulRed

I went it alone. Started early Sat morning and finished with the level check procedure first thing Sun. I chose to take a 10 min drive between fills to ensure a good mix of the new and old. Of course...that meant a hot exhaust so I had to wait for it to cool down before I crawled back underneath.

My very first drain of the OEM fluid, I had 2 and 3/4 qts come out and I put back in 3 new. The next 3 drains yielding exactly 3 qts each. On my last fill I put in 3.5 (like Alchemist suggested) and then during the fluid level check procedure....once at correct temp...I had 1/4 qt come out before it went to a "trickle" and I closed it up. I put 12.5 quarts through the system total.

Although not difficult...and by doing the drives between fills and subsequent "cool downs"...it was time consuming. I'm considering servicing this tranny, moving forward, like I do on my Honda's....which is...now that I have basically all new fluid in...I may do a 3 qt drain/fill after every 15k miles. Then after a total of 60k miles...do another 12.5 qt process. That...or just try the $239 flush by Toyota with their WS dedicated machine. Considering I paid $132 just for the 13 qts of WS from my local Toyota dealer...paying an additional $107 to save me the labor/time/OBD jumping clusterf#$k...it may be worth it. Then again...as I'm sure most DIY'rs will agree...the pride and satisfaction in a job well done is still something I get out of projects like this, lol.

Oh, in addition...I did use a new tranny plug gasket (crush washer) and found it at a Toyota parts dept. It's part number 35178-30010 and it was about $5 (yikes). The crush washers (which are bigger) for the rear diff plug and the oil drain plug were only like $.93 Not sure why there is such a large price difference.

tjpgi

I have a 2001 GS300 with 103,000 miles. No transmission problems, but I would like to change the fluid since I plan on another "lifetime" of use. Would the procedure for checking the fluid level at correct temperature be any different from the current procedure listed in this thread?



Thanks

Tom

sha4000

iTrader: (1)

The procedure in this thread does not apply to your model year. You can just use the drain bolt on your transmission pan and re-fill through the transmission dipstick. Make sure to use T-IV transmission fluid. There is no special procedure. You can go the the GS second generation forum for specifics if you want specific details for your car.

https://www.clublexus.com/forums/gs-...1998-2005-184/

Gotcha350

Completely different method...check the 2GS thread for advice....

burny

Yours is easy to do. Just get an oil pan and put under driver side radiator. Lift driver side transmission cooler line off bottom of radiator with car turned off. Have someone start the car while you are under there. Let it pump about 20-30 seconds to get around 3 quarts out and then turn off. Measure what you took out and put that much new fluid back in the dipstick hole. Do this until you get 12 quarts out. Then start car and run it through the gears and let it reach OPERATING TEMP and then check dipstick while car is running to see if fluid is accurate. 30 minute job tops.

tjpgi

Well today is my lucky day.
Thanks for all of the help.

burny

Using the method you mentioned: Are there any parts in the transmission that could become devoid of fluid during this process and become damaged? As long as I drain 3 qts, or less, am I fairly safe in preventing damage?

sha4000

iTrader: (1)

If you are going to use the radiator cooler method I would just buy enough T-IV to replace all the old fluid. I would drain 2 quarts at a time, then replace with new fluid through the dipstick. Repeat this process until the fluid is cherry red coming out of the hose then put everything back together and check the fluid level like burny states.

burny

I do 3 at a time. but 2 is fine. You should buy 13 quarts just to be safe. There is no reason to be concerned of damaging anything

tjpgi

Sounds good. Thanks for all the help.

raj18

I recently bought a 2007 GS350 RWD in excellent condition with 173K miles.

Recently, the transmission shifts started to be a little rough and also I started getting a thump from the back almost every time I came to a stop, felt like the transmission was downshifting and I could feel it. I figured it was time to drain & fill the trans fluid. The previous owner said he had the transmission fluid changed about a couple of years ago, not at the dealer, but at some other shop.

On a recent oil change, my mechanic mentioned to me that there was a minor leak from the transmission, as he saw some fluid around the drain pan. I thought maybe I was a little low on the fluid, hence the rougher shifts. I figured that I would be low on tranny fluid once I drained it out.

I used the great DIY by "alchemist", and followed it step by step. I ended up changing all the fluid at one time, 3 at a time.

I bought 13 quarts of WS fluid from the Toyota dealer.

First drain: got out 2.25 quarts, put in 3 Quarts
Second drain: got 3 quarts out, put in 3 quarts
Third drain: got 3 quarts out, put in 3 quarts
Fourth & last drain: got 3 quarts out, put in 3.5 quarts

Total drained out: 11.25 quarts, put in 12.5 quarts

Then I did the fluid level check procedure. I undid the overflow plug, and fluid started coming out a lot. After a bit it slowed down, at which point I plugged it back in. I was surprised to see how much came back out. After measuring, 2.25 quarts came out from the overflow plug. I wasn't expecting that much to come out.

I am wondering if whoever the previous owner used to change out the fluid, maybe put too much fluid in?? Once 2.25 quarts came out, I have now 10.25 quarts in the tranny. I added an additional .5 quart, so total I put in is 10.75 quarts.

Then I went for a test drive, the shifts seemed much smoother than before and that thump I was getting went away. Granted, I only drove about 2 miles on the test drive, will have to drive it some more to see if it comes back or not. The only other thing I noticed during the test drive was that when the transmission was shifting gears at low speeds, it was almost like a "whine" sound, the shifts were smooth, but heard the transmission whine just a little bit. Don't think I have heard that before. Not sure if the trans fluid needs some time to fully go through the system, hence the sound. Overall, good results, except the very low whine sound.

I am a bit confused as I drained 11.25 quarts, put a total of 10.75 quarts (12.5 quarts I put in minus the 2.25 that drained back out from overflow plug, then I added an additional .5 quart). I am still .5 quart short of what was in there to begin with.


Questions:

1. Why would the overflow plug drain out 2.25 quarts - even though I only put in a total of 12.5 quarts to begin with?

2. With 10.75 quarts in there now, do I add more fluid? But if I do, seems like it would come back out just like the last time.

I just want to make sure I have enough fluid in there, any ideas or suggestions are greatly appreciated.

Thanks

burny

did you use the method of jumpering the 4 and 13 pins on the OBD? The car has to be in operating temp range in order to get the correct fill. The fluid expands as temp increases.

raj18

I let it warm up for about 10 minutes before checking the overflow plug, but honestly didn't do the jump procedure.

I guess that's where I faulted. I assume I can still do that jump procedure and check the overflow plug after the operating temp is reached?

I would assume that nothing would come out as I am probably a little short on fluid, since 2.25 quarts drained out the first time.

burny

you need to do this. you want a trickle coming out once the op temp is met. make sure car is cooled down before you do it.

Gs3500

My 2008 gs350 didn't have the plastic covering the entire transmission pan... Is it suppose to be like that? Can anyone confirm? As a result all the bolts are rusted!! Now I'm afraid of trying to take any bolt off