I suppose you're right !
CVT fluid change 2020 KIA Forte EX
- Thread starter Walter1982
- Start date
Happy Memorial Day everybody!
What better day to get under the car in this 90 degree heat eh?
I finally figured out how to use the car scanner app to monitor transmission fluid temp. Even though it says ATF fluid temperature, it does mean IVT in this case. Today I can finally do this job.
What better day to get under the car in this 90 degree heat eh?
I finally figured out how to use the car scanner app to monitor transmission fluid temp. Even though it says ATF fluid temperature, it does mean IVT in this case. Today I can finally do this job.
My nephew bought a 2018 Honda HRV a few months ago with about 130K. I advised him to change the CVT fluid and he bought Valvoline CVT fluid in the blue bottle shown in post #42 (not Maxlife). We changed it and he says it's running fine. I was surprised that the fluid that came out looked so good so I rang the guy who sold it to him* and he told me he had changed it using Honda OE fluid before selling the car.
*I told my brother who bought this car for his son to ask the seller if the plugs, coolant, CVT fluid etc....were ever changed but of course he didn't. The seller was a LEO who flipped cars on the side and when I asked him he was glad to let me know that he did all the maintenance before selling it. He seemed like a 'car guy' and we had a pleasant conversation. By the way....we never did any kind of ECU 'reset' etc...
As I mentioned before, "IVT" is an acronym that Kia/Hyundai made up to make their CVT seem special or unique. "IVT"s, CVTs, DCTs, are all Automatic Transmissions so "ATF" is appropriate enough. As long as you can differentiate between Engine / Transmission fluid and Engine Coolant temperature.
I completed the drain/fill today. Here are my thoughts.
I didn't take any pictures or videos, even though it was my first time doing it, I don't believe there's anything about this procedure that needs to be seen to be understood, there's a few youtube videos I used as a guide that helped to see what to expect.
I'm not really happy with how it went, I made a slight miscalculation and things got really messy. This reminds me of my first ever oil change on this car, I made a huge mess, but over time I learned how to do an oil change very clean. My next IVT fluid change will me much cleaner.
I decided to warm up the IVT before draining it. If there's any metal particles floating around, it's good to get them suspended in the fluid before draining, which means warming it up to about 125F. I do the same with oil changes, I drive around for 20 minutes and get the oil really hot.
I used the Veepeak "Mini Bluetooth OBD2 Scanner for Android ONLY" and the car scanner app. I had to buy a specific 24mm socket for removing the drain plug, injection plug, and level check plug.
I ordered 2 drain plug gaskets at KiaPartsNow.com, and they came in copper. My drain plug had a copper gasket, the level check plug and injection plug both had aluminum gaskets. I believe copper and aluminum are both good choices as gaskets? I didn't have a third new gasket for the injection plug. I'm not too worried about the injection plug as it's not holding down any fluid.
I understand this IVT fluid expands as it gets hotter. I know many people measure the exact amount of fluid they drained, and then pour in the same amount of new fluid. But there is a level check plug on the side of this transmission, which makes it impossible to overfill. I don't feel I need to measure anything. After going over the service manual and reading people's experiences with draining IVT fluid for the Forte, Soul, and Seltos, I decided to warm up the fluid before draining.
So, I lifted the car, removed the plastic cover, then I started the car, and using the Car Scanner app I waited until it got to 125F. As it began approaching 125F, I started doing the shifter sequence from P,R,N,D and back. I did this several times, just to get the fluid warm and moving around.
I shut off the car and went to drain the fluid. I used a breaker bar to remove the drain plug, and drained about 132 FL OZ of IVT fluid. The fluid was dark, but when you look closely it was kind of purple, and you could kind of see thru it, like when it's just a thin layer.
After draining I cleaned up the drain plug, put a copper gasket on it, and torqued it down.
Next, it was time to pour in fluid.
The service manual states to remove the air tube and air box to reach the injection plug. This gives me an opportunity to clean up these parts, using a brush, getting the sand out of the bottom of the air box that holds the engine air filter. It also allows me to look at my electronic throttle body, which looked surprisingly very clean, because I removed it and deep cleaned it almost 2 years ago.
The service manual says to fill 5 liters of IVT fluid. It seemed like a lot.
I had figured, that the more new fluid I pour in, when it mixes with the old fluid, it will be a good mixture of mostly new fluid with some old fluid.
This is where I start to brainstorm and I wonder, should I do several drain/fills, that way, I'll be left with a mostly clean fluid in the IVT. It holds a total of 7.1 quarts. So when most people do a drain/fill, they drain out about 3.5 quarts, and pour back in 3.5 quarts, so it's a 50/50 mixture of dirty fluid with new fluid.
This is really unsatisfactory. I wish there was a way to get all the old fluid out, and then fill it with all new fluid.
I suppose, that after doing a drain/fill I can drive around for a few days, and do another drain/fill. Maybe then I'll have reached a higher ratio of new/old fluid, maybe like 75%.
It's kind of annoying. Is it necessary to do this? Or is a 50/50 ratio sufficient?
So, would it be better to do infrequent, but multiple drain/fills, for example, do a triple drain/fill every 70,000 miles, (resulting in a mostly new fluid mixture) as opposed to, doing more frequent single drain/fills, such as every 30k miles, (resulting in a 50/50 mixture of new vs old fluid).
Would one result in better IVT health over the other ?
This long funnell came in very handy.
Anyways, the service manual says to pour in 5 liters, so I did, lol.
And as I was pouring the 5th liter, I noticed fluid was spilling out of the injection plug hole and all over the cardboard beneath my car.
Fortunately this IVT fluid isn't as greasy as engine oil. I cleaned up as best I could, I put back in the injection hole plug, and realizing I had overfilled the IVT with fluid, I then removed the fluid level check plug to drain some out.
A lot of clean IVT fluid poured out (doh), and once the stream of fluid started getting thinner, I put back in the level check plug and went to start the car.
As the fluid temperature approach 125F, I started shifting thru all the gears, multiple times.
This part gets confusing for me. The service manual doesn't say to shut off the car before removing the fluid level check plug, I believe you're supposed to do this while the engine is running.
So I removed the level check plug, and there was some brown fluid dripping out of the hole. It wasn't like a thin stream, it was more like drops.
When I was draining out the excess IVT fluid from the level check plug, it was coming out in a thin stream when I closed the plug.
But now, after running the IVT and shifting the gears, when I opened the level check plug, it wasn't a thin stream, it was just drops.
I was worried this was insufficient fluid flow.
So I removed the air box and air tubes again, lol, and poured in another liter of fluid. Torqued down the plug, and put back in the air box and tubes.
Ran the engine, got it back up to 125F, did the shift sequence, and went to open the level check plug, Instead of just drops, there was at first a thick stream of seemingly brown, dirty fluid, and, with the engine running, I waited until it was a thin stream, and closed up the level check plug. Then I shut off the engine.
I torqued it down, lowered the car, and went for a test drive. I had the car scanner app on the whole time, I drove for 20 minutes, and also on the highway, and the fluid got up to 185F and didn't go any higher. I'll keep an eye on the temperature of the fluid as I drive around the next few days.
I wasn't sure what to expect. I wasn't sure if it should run quieter, or smoother, or shift smoother. It seems to run nice and quiet. I will pay attention to any noticeable differences over the next few days. If it is performing better, or quieter, or smoother, I should be able to notice it.
Kia does not have any recommendations with cleaning magnets, replacing filters, or how often replacing the fluid. The severe maintenance schedule suggests every 60k miles.
It seems we have to come up with our own maintenance schedule.
What type of drain/fills should I be doing? Single, double, or triple drain/fill? Every 40k miles, or 60k? Should I try to reach the highest ratio of clean fluid I can? How often should I clean the magnets, every 60k miles, every 100k? How often to replace the filters?
I'm guessing in order of most importance, is to replace the fluid, followed by cleaning the magnets, and then replacing the 2 filters is probably the least frequent thing to do.
It was messy but it was a great learning experience. I am now more confident to remove the oil pan and clean out the magnets, and possibly replace the 2 filters.
I didn't take any pictures or videos, even though it was my first time doing it, I don't believe there's anything about this procedure that needs to be seen to be understood, there's a few youtube videos I used as a guide that helped to see what to expect.
I'm not really happy with how it went, I made a slight miscalculation and things got really messy. This reminds me of my first ever oil change on this car, I made a huge mess, but over time I learned how to do an oil change very clean. My next IVT fluid change will me much cleaner.
I decided to warm up the IVT before draining it. If there's any metal particles floating around, it's good to get them suspended in the fluid before draining, which means warming it up to about 125F. I do the same with oil changes, I drive around for 20 minutes and get the oil really hot.
I used the Veepeak "Mini Bluetooth OBD2 Scanner for Android ONLY" and the car scanner app. I had to buy a specific 24mm socket for removing the drain plug, injection plug, and level check plug.
I ordered 2 drain plug gaskets at KiaPartsNow.com, and they came in copper. My drain plug had a copper gasket, the level check plug and injection plug both had aluminum gaskets. I believe copper and aluminum are both good choices as gaskets? I didn't have a third new gasket for the injection plug. I'm not too worried about the injection plug as it's not holding down any fluid.
I understand this IVT fluid expands as it gets hotter. I know many people measure the exact amount of fluid they drained, and then pour in the same amount of new fluid. But there is a level check plug on the side of this transmission, which makes it impossible to overfill. I don't feel I need to measure anything. After going over the service manual and reading people's experiences with draining IVT fluid for the Forte, Soul, and Seltos, I decided to warm up the fluid before draining.
So, I lifted the car, removed the plastic cover, then I started the car, and using the Car Scanner app I waited until it got to 125F. As it began approaching 125F, I started doing the shifter sequence from P,R,N,D and back. I did this several times, just to get the fluid warm and moving around.
I shut off the car and went to drain the fluid. I used a breaker bar to remove the drain plug, and drained about 132 FL OZ of IVT fluid. The fluid was dark, but when you look closely it was kind of purple, and you could kind of see thru it, like when it's just a thin layer.
After draining I cleaned up the drain plug, put a copper gasket on it, and torqued it down.
Next, it was time to pour in fluid.
The service manual states to remove the air tube and air box to reach the injection plug. This gives me an opportunity to clean up these parts, using a brush, getting the sand out of the bottom of the air box that holds the engine air filter. It also allows me to look at my electronic throttle body, which looked surprisingly very clean, because I removed it and deep cleaned it almost 2 years ago.
The service manual says to fill 5 liters of IVT fluid. It seemed like a lot.
I had figured, that the more new fluid I pour in, when it mixes with the old fluid, it will be a good mixture of mostly new fluid with some old fluid.
This is where I start to brainstorm and I wonder, should I do several drain/fills, that way, I'll be left with a mostly clean fluid in the IVT. It holds a total of 7.1 quarts. So when most people do a drain/fill, they drain out about 3.5 quarts, and pour back in 3.5 quarts, so it's a 50/50 mixture of dirty fluid with new fluid.
This is really unsatisfactory. I wish there was a way to get all the old fluid out, and then fill it with all new fluid.
I suppose, that after doing a drain/fill I can drive around for a few days, and do another drain/fill. Maybe then I'll have reached a higher ratio of new/old fluid, maybe like 75%.
It's kind of annoying. Is it necessary to do this? Or is a 50/50 ratio sufficient?
So, would it be better to do infrequent, but multiple drain/fills, for example, do a triple drain/fill every 70,000 miles, (resulting in a mostly new fluid mixture) as opposed to, doing more frequent single drain/fills, such as every 30k miles, (resulting in a 50/50 mixture of new vs old fluid).
Would one result in better IVT health over the other ?
This long funnell came in very handy.
Anyways, the service manual says to pour in 5 liters, so I did, lol.
And as I was pouring the 5th liter, I noticed fluid was spilling out of the injection plug hole and all over the cardboard beneath my car.
Fortunately this IVT fluid isn't as greasy as engine oil. I cleaned up as best I could, I put back in the injection hole plug, and realizing I had overfilled the IVT with fluid, I then removed the fluid level check plug to drain some out.
A lot of clean IVT fluid poured out (doh), and once the stream of fluid started getting thinner, I put back in the level check plug and went to start the car.
As the fluid temperature approach 125F, I started shifting thru all the gears, multiple times.
This part gets confusing for me. The service manual doesn't say to shut off the car before removing the fluid level check plug, I believe you're supposed to do this while the engine is running.
So I removed the level check plug, and there was some brown fluid dripping out of the hole. It wasn't like a thin stream, it was more like drops.
When I was draining out the excess IVT fluid from the level check plug, it was coming out in a thin stream when I closed the plug.
But now, after running the IVT and shifting the gears, when I opened the level check plug, it wasn't a thin stream, it was just drops.
I was worried this was insufficient fluid flow.
So I removed the air box and air tubes again, lol, and poured in another liter of fluid. Torqued down the plug, and put back in the air box and tubes.
Ran the engine, got it back up to 125F, did the shift sequence, and went to open the level check plug, Instead of just drops, there was at first a thick stream of seemingly brown, dirty fluid, and, with the engine running, I waited until it was a thin stream, and closed up the level check plug. Then I shut off the engine.
I torqued it down, lowered the car, and went for a test drive. I had the car scanner app on the whole time, I drove for 20 minutes, and also on the highway, and the fluid got up to 185F and didn't go any higher. I'll keep an eye on the temperature of the fluid as I drive around the next few days.
I wasn't sure what to expect. I wasn't sure if it should run quieter, or smoother, or shift smoother. It seems to run nice and quiet. I will pay attention to any noticeable differences over the next few days. If it is performing better, or quieter, or smoother, I should be able to notice it.
Kia does not have any recommendations with cleaning magnets, replacing filters, or how often replacing the fluid. The severe maintenance schedule suggests every 60k miles.
It seems we have to come up with our own maintenance schedule.
What type of drain/fills should I be doing? Single, double, or triple drain/fill? Every 40k miles, or 60k? Should I try to reach the highest ratio of clean fluid I can? How often should I clean the magnets, every 60k miles, every 100k? How often to replace the filters?
I'm guessing in order of most importance, is to replace the fluid, followed by cleaning the magnets, and then replacing the 2 filters is probably the least frequent thing to do.
It was messy but it was a great learning experience. I am now more confident to remove the oil pan and clean out the magnets, and possibly replace the 2 filters.
Sounds like you had a good learning experience doing this service. Lots of details!
If you want to optimize your CVT fluid maintenance then you'll need to do a batch of oil analysis and follow the results & recommendations from the lab. I'm sure plenty here will give you advise if you post the results here. Otherwise I would use the OEM recommendation of 60k as a guide once you have the system / fluid clean. I would do a CVT drain & fill at every engine oil change until the fluid looks "clean" and then use the 60k as a guide.
How much fluid does the transmission hold? How much is drained?
If you want to optimize your CVT fluid maintenance then you'll need to do a batch of oil analysis and follow the results & recommendations from the lab. I'm sure plenty here will give you advise if you post the results here. Otherwise I would use the OEM recommendation of 60k as a guide once you have the system / fluid clean. I would do a CVT drain & fill at every engine oil change until the fluid looks "clean" and then use the 60k as a guide.
How much fluid does the transmission hold? How much is drained?
I drained out 132 FL OZ, which is about 4 quarts. The transmission holds about 7.1 quarts. So it's roughly a 50/50 mixture of new/old fluid.
After filling it with new fluid, I then ran the engine, and opened the fluid level check plug to drain out the excess, it was very disappointing to see the fluid coming out a dirty brown fluid, especially after all this trouble of doing this procedure.
Doing a fluid exchange with each oil change could get pricey. It's about $60 for 4 quarts of CVT fluid. But, I likely won't be doing this often. As they say, the price of multiple fluid changes is still dramatically lower than the price of CVT repair/replacement.
I will have to think it over.
After filling it with new fluid, I then ran the engine, and opened the fluid level check plug to drain out the excess, it was very disappointing to see the fluid coming out a dirty brown fluid, especially after all this trouble of doing this procedure.
Doing a fluid exchange with each oil change could get pricey. It's about $60 for 4 quarts of CVT fluid. But, I likely won't be doing this often. As they say, the price of multiple fluid changes is still dramatically lower than the price of CVT repair/replacement.
I will have to think it over.
Glad you got it done and learned some things along the way. You're making good progress.
As I've mentioned before, CVT fluid is very common now and not much more expensive than engine oil. In Canada I can get Valvoline Restore and Protect 5w30 for $43 / 5 liter and Valvoline MaxLife CVTF / ATF for $50 / 5 liter. $10 a liter Canadian for a quality transmission fluid. Amsoil is closer to $20 and Nissan was $30. Guess which one is the worse buy and the worst in performance?
I would definitely recommend changing the CVTF with each engine oil change until it looks "clean". Then move to a more standard "severe" OCI.
I suppose you're right. A few consecutive fluid changes in a short amount of time would almost equal a proper "flush" I suppose, by getting as much of the old fluid out as possible.
Is my math correct though?
If the transmission holds 7 quarts, and I drain 3.5, then fill 3.5 of new fluid, I now have a 50/50 mixture of new and old fluid.
Then, let's say I run the engine, go thru the shifting procedure, get the fluid mixed up, drain 3.5 quarts again, and re-fill 3.5 quarts of new fluid, will I now have a mixture of 75/25 of new/old fluid?
Yes, that's right. I wouldn't get too excited about how much old fluid is still in the system but a 2nd fluid change would be a good idea either now or at your next service. Regardless of what you do now having the fresh / clean fluid in the system is helping.
I'm curious to see what ours (2020 Forte FE) looks like when I change it and the filter just after 60K, this summer or fall. This was at 40660 miles in May '24
