Senior

I have a 1999 RX300 with 174,000, mostly highway miles. I have been hearing a lot about transmission failures and am getting a little paranoid. I have had a "drain and fill" about every 30 or 40,000 miles since it was new but never had the pan down. It has never had any dark fluid or signs of metal. The dealer says it is not necessary to drop the pan because of the wire filter, which is apperantly unique to this year and model. Should I stick with his suggestion or just say "I want it done"?

Thanks for your response.

hypervish

If it hasn't failed by now, it likely won't. From what I've seen, if these transmissions do fail they do it at around 50-100k miles. After that, very few have failed. And, remember we here online are a minority, there are thousands of people who haven't had any problems such as myself and my uncle. My uncle has almost 400k miles on his original engine and transmission. I have 172k on the original engine and transmission as well.

If anything, you can drain and fill every 15k, or every year. Which is what I do.

Senior

Thanks for the feedback. It makes me feel alot better

NyCrAzY

+1 at hypervish.

Also don't get paranoid because a lot of people would sign up on the forum just to discuss about their transmission failure.

I too myself have a 1999 RX300 @ 177k miles.

Did a drain and fill @ valvoline @ 175k miles on the original transmission. These cars can go the distance as long they're properly maintained.