ATF change interval. 4T65E

[Slippery_Pete]

After how many miles would you change this ATF?
Trans is from the car in my sig. it see's an occasional bit of spirited driving but pretty tame for the most part. Car has a few bolt on performance mods including a shift kit and a ecu that has upped shift pressures for faster shifts.

Fluid was all new dex 6 (all 12 quarts) with a bottle of lubguard red.

 

[jkhawaii]

manufacturer recomends every 100,000 miles or every 50k severe duty but, in general 30,000 intervals are usually recommended by places like dealers and lube shops. I would recommend that you install the updated oil pan magnets, installing 3 (or was it 2) stronger round magnets and removing the weak square magnet to catch more iron and steel wear metals

 

[Johnny248]

I like 30k intervals, however we get a ton of these transmissions that have a ton of miles on them without ever being changed. It seems that the shift solenoids go bad all the time in the 65e, but I'm not sure if fluid as any effect on that at all.

Play it safe, it's your baby. Spend $100 every couple years and just do it.

 

[caravanmike]

every 30,000. with that said i drain and fill mine every 10,000

 

[Steve S]

Trans oil life is dictated by the heat it is subjected to and the contamination from the trans wear or what ever else can contaminate the oil. Clean oil is always good so change the oil and filter as mentioned ,30 to 50 thousand miles cant hurt. Remember most trannie failures occur from parts failure. Clean oil and filters will allow the trans to last as long as it can last. Shift kits are hard on the trans,as they increase the shock loading on the parts, The higher line pressures are a necessary evil when increasing the HP as to stop slipping of the clutches.

 

[beast3300]

/of topic

What kind of shiftkit do you have, and pcm?

/end off topic

OP: I drop the pan and replenish every 2 years regardless of mileage on my GS. For me that is about 20-25k miles. I don't drive far however it does get dozens of track passes.

 

[Slippery_Pete]

Thanks for all the replies, guys
Originally Posted By: beast3300
/of topic

What kind of shiftkit do you have, and pcm?

/end off topic

OP: I drop the pan and replenish every 2 years regardless of mileage on my GS. For me that is about 20-25k miles. I don't drive far however it does get dozens of track passes.

Shift kit is a DIY with parts from lowes. If you go to the DIY section on Regalgs.org you'll see my write up.
PCM is from Overkill.

 

[beast3300]

Originally Posted By: Slippery_Pete
Thanks for all the replies, guys
Originally Posted By: beast3300
/of topic

What kind of shiftkit do you have, and pcm?

/end off topic

OP: I drop the pan and replenish every 2 years regardless of mileage on my GS. For me that is about 20-25k miles. I don't drive far however it does get dozens of track passes.

Shift kit is a DIY with parts from lowes. If you go to the DIY section on Regalgs.org you'll see my write up.
PCM is from Overkill.


Cool, I have the really old W-body store shift kit. Just springs and spacers. I'm glad to see Will is still at it. Previously he was hard to get ahold of from what I remember on RegalGS.

 

[Slippery_Pete]

Originally Posted By: beast3300
Originally Posted By: Slippery_Pete
Thanks for all the replies, guys
Originally Posted By: beast3300
/of topic

What kind of shiftkit do you have, and pcm?

/end off topic

OP: I drop the pan and replenish every 2 years regardless of mileage on my GS. For me that is about 20-25k miles. I don't drive far however it does get dozens of track passes.

Shift kit is a DIY with parts from lowes. If you go to the DIY section on Regalgs.org you'll see my write up.
PCM is from Overkill.


Cool, I have the really old W-body store shift kit. Just springs and spacers. I'm glad to see Will is still at it. Previously he was hard to get ahold of from what I remember on RegalGS.
he is still hard to get a hold of but him being somewhat local to me helps a lot

 

[WishIhadatruck]

I've been doing pan drops every 30k miles with a filter change. At 90k miles I did a UOA and it looked pretty good. I was using M1 ATF up until 90k. At 90k miles I flushed it with Dex VI and have continued the pan drops every 30k with Dex VI. I just did the 150k mile service a couple of weeks ago. I might do another UOA at 180k. I also added a shift kit. I put it in last winter after I started experiencing very hard shifts to due to sensor/solenoid issues forcing it into full line pressure. When doing some city driving in hot weather it would almost always do it. The shift kit has cured the issue so far.

My previous car ('94 GP) with a 4T60E had 30k pan drops its whole life with various brands of dino Dex III. It was still shifting great at 212k miles when I gave it away.

 

[demarpaint]

30K pan drops with a line flush always worked for me. The thought of replacing a transmission is sickening.

 

[meep]

I'm a solid 30k guy unless it's a honda. I'm an every-other OC AT swap (so every 15k) until the Z1 is gone and the amsoil is in with a honda...

M

 

[pbm]

I finally got around to changing the OE ATF/filter in my friends LaSabre. At 41K it still looked good (red) and the internals were spotless. While the magnet was covered in ferrous gook, I was surprised how clean everything else looked.
I think these trannies can go 40 or 50K easily (between fluid changes) if not used for towing.

How many quarts of fluid usually drain when the pan is dropped on a 4T65E?

 

[Letter_K]

Mine is about 7 quarts of the 10 and some change quarts total capacity when you drop the pan. Amsoils site should list both specs if you want to double-check.

 

[NHHEMI]

Originally Posted By: Johnny248
I like 30k intervals, however we get a ton of these transmissions that have a ton of miles on them without ever being changed. It seems that the shift solenoids go bad all the time in the 65e, but I'm not sure if fluid as any effect on that at all.

Play it safe, it's your baby. Spend $100 every couple years and just do it.


OP - Yup, watch out for that shift solenoid as the guy above says. You have to drop the entire tranny to replace it as GM in their infinite wisdom requires you to remove the valve body from the top not through the pan on the bottom. The whole tranny ahs to come down to replace an $80 solenoid in the valve body = STUPID!

I would absolutely say do the fluid every 30K - 50K max. Just had to rebuild the same tranny in my Sister's car to the tune of $2800( had to replace the solenoid as well ). Car had 118K and never had the tranny fluid replaced. The TC was shot as were most of the internals. DO NOT go 100K on the fluid. GM is out of their mind saying the fluid can go that long as is any car mfg with any tranny fluid.

The tranny in question has a lot of problems. It needs to be serviced regularly.

 

[sciphi]

Originally Posted By: NHHEMI
Originally Posted By: Johnny248
I like 30k intervals, however we get a ton of these transmissions that have a ton of miles on them without ever being changed. It seems that the shift solenoids go bad all the time in the 65e, but I'm not sure if fluid as any effect on that at all.

Play it safe, it's your baby. Spend $100 every couple years and just do it.


OP - Yup, watch out for that shift solenoid as the guy above says. You have to drop the entire tranny to replace it as GM in their infinite wisdom requires you to remove the valve body from the top not through the pan on the bottom. The whole tranny ahs to come down to replace an $80 solenoid in the valve body = STUPID!

I would absolutely say do the fluid every 30K - 50K max. Just had to rebuild the same tranny in my Sister's car to the tune of $2800( had to replace the solenoid as well ). Car had 118K and never had the tranny fluid replaced. The TC was shot as were most of the internals. DO NOT go 100K on the fluid. GM is out of their mind saying the fluid can go that long as is any car mfg with any tranny fluid.

The tranny in question has a lot of problems. It needs to be serviced regularly.


A TransGo shift kit will "work around" a bad pressure control solenoid, and installs through the pan. Been there, dropped the pan to install it 25k miles ago.

I'd shorten the change interval to 15-20k on regular ATF, and run 30-40k on synthetic ATF.

 

[RnR]

Originally Posted By: jkhawaii
I would recommend that you install the updated oil pan magnets, installing 3 (or was it 2) stronger round magnets and removing the weak square magnet
If I may ask you to elaborate a tad, where did this directive come from?

 

[NHHEMI]

Originally Posted By: sciphi
Originally Posted By: NHHEMI
Originally Posted By: Johnny248
I like 30k intervals, however we get a ton of these transmissions that have a ton of miles on them without ever being changed. It seems that the shift solenoids go bad all the time in the 65e, but I'm not sure if fluid as any effect on that at all.

Play it safe, it's your baby. Spend $100 every couple years and just do it.


OP - Yup, watch out for that shift solenoid as the guy above says. You have to drop the entire tranny to replace it as GM in their infinite wisdom requires you to remove the valve body from the top not through the pan on the bottom. The whole tranny ahs to come down to replace an $80 solenoid in the valve body = STUPID!

I would absolutely say do the fluid every 30K - 50K max. Just had to rebuild the same tranny in my Sister's car to the tune of $2800( had to replace the solenoid as well ). Car had 118K and never had the tranny fluid replaced. The TC was shot as were most of the internals. DO NOT go 100K on the fluid. GM is out of their mind saying the fluid can go that long as is any car mfg with any tranny fluid.

The tranny in question has a lot of problems. It needs to be serviced regularly.


A TransGo shift kit will "work around" a bad pressure control solenoid, and installs through the pan. Been there, dropped the pan to install it 25k miles ago.

I'd shorten the change interval to 15-20k on regular ATF, and run 30-40k on synthetic ATF.


The tranny in my Sister's car was so badly gone it would not have saved her the rebuild. However, I will keep this in mind if I run into it with other people with this tranny.

 

[sciphi]

NHHEMI, there are tons of them out there. It's only a matter of time before another pops up with the exact same problems.

 

[NHHEMI]

I know but I don't know a lot of people with GM cars and this tranny so no clue how long before I run into it again. I do know now, after researching it, that this was a HUGE problem.