Riverguy

I hear and read so much about RX300 transmission failures. Is the AWD or the FWD that has the most problems? My '01 is the AWD, has 133K miles on it and still works great. I have a friend with the identical car and he's got 180K on his with no problems. It would be good to know which is the weak one!

gomeybear

mckellyb

I'm fairly certain the innards of both are the same save for what is effectively a clutched PTO for the AWD version.

Our AWD has 145K on it, and it's fine.

Riverguy

Thanks for the feedback! I just bought a beautiful 2001 AWD with 130K miles and I'm hoping for the best! Your explanation at least gives credibility to the notion that it is both the AWD and FWD units that have the problem. I'm hoping that faithful servicing of the transmission may be what makes the difference, because the one I bought came with all the service records and it has been taken care of. Having to spend $3000 to repair my $5000 car would be a real bummer!

mckellyb

Pro tip:

Do a drain and fill on the trans every other engine oil change. Well, every 20K is my general rule.

Yes, my wife's RX is on 10K Mobil 1 changes.

The LS is at 15K, and may go higher.

I'd say swap all the transmission oil over to synthetic, I use Castrol's import synthetic, but it's not inexpensive and to do it properly you really need an electric pump to swap it all out. I made a system for about $30, but that was for the LS's "sealed" transmission.

Sent the OEM oil in for analysis...it'd been done for for a while. This was at 112K miles.

ukrkoz

We sold our 99 RX300 with 154 000 miles on it and never a trannie issue. That said, I serviced it religiously. We had AWD model. We towed trailer from TN to WA with it. It became eventually a bit jerky, but was back to fine after each ATF change with Transtune flush.

Riverguy

Thank you everyone for all the info! I'm going to just go ahead and do a drain-and-fill, along with the filter change now. It's been 35K miles since the last time and they have all been done since new at a Toyota dealer (every 30K miles for 130K miles), so It's probably best to stick with Toyota ATF?

Oddly, my owner's manual instructs to NEVER change the transmission fluid unless the car is subjected to severe service. Seems really strange!

Seafoam Transtune is safe in the AWD Lexus transmission? I'd love to do that since I've had amazing shudder-stop results in others.

hypervish

I wouldn't play with additives if the transmission is fine. I've got 250k + miles on the original transmission, have changed ATF every 10-15k miles. Have used Toyota Type-IV/Mobil 3309, Castrol Transmax IMV, and Valvoline MaxLife.

Riverguy

I love success stories! Thank you for that! My RX300 has 130K miles on it and the transmission has had the ATF drained-and-filled every 3000 miles since new, and at a Toyota dealer. I'm assuming they use Toyota ATF, so I think I'll just keep on doing what has worked so well so far.

Thanks for sharing!

sktn77a

iTrader: (2)

I'd be wary of doing this. I did it a few years back and had problems afterwards with vibration in the transmission when accelerating. Did a flush and fill with Toyota trans fluid and the vibration went away.