MaxLife or M1 ATF in Place of Mer V?

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Originally Posted By: Pablo

We are all entitled to our own opinions, but when reality shows something different, others can speak up. Honda products do fine with Amsoil ATF. Too many people with over 100K miles on Amsoil ATF, to leave it to chance with Honda labeled ATF.


I interpret "leave it to chance with Honda labelled ATF" as implying the Honda ATF can't protect Honda transmissions
 
Originally Posted By: FoxS
Originally Posted By: Pablo

We are all entitled to our own opinions, but when reality shows something different, others can speak up. Honda products do fine with Amsoil ATF. Too many people with over 100K miles on Amsoil ATF, to leave it to chance with Honda labeled ATF.


I interpret "leave it to chance with Honda labelled ATF" as implying the Honda ATF can't protect Honda transmissions


The implication at that point in the conversation was that only Honda ATF protects. Just saying your chances are no better than another well designed fluid. For all the supposed testing Honda did, they didn't catch (or something much worse) all their AT problems - how would they really know their fluid is good for the long haul?

My responses are to the Honda quip above.
 
Originally Posted By: Pablo


AT. Honda. ATF. Testing. How did that work out for them??

Please come on, they have a HUGE failure rate. Honda didn't reduce the chance of failure at all, they increased it!


Like ANY manufacturer they will have isolated designs that can be troublesome, but of course you well know that most Honda AT when maintained reasonably and not abused heavily will last as many as 250k miles or more.

Like the other poster mentioned the fluid has not been the source for the troublesome units.
 
Originally Posted By: antiqueshell
Originally Posted By: Zako2



MaxLife is much thinner than most true Mercon V fluids I have checked for viscosity. MaxLife may be "recommended" by Valvoline, but it does not have a formal Mercon V license.



If you REALLY want to chance a little as possible with your transmission USE THE CAR MANUFACTURER SPEC PRODUCT AND NOTHING ELSE! Especially applies to Honda products!



This is a very good recommendation for ATF. Note that I belong to portion of readers of this web site who would sometimes make an educated guess and use a motor oil that's not always based on manufacturers spec, and yet I normally would insist to use manufacturer spec fluid for ATF. Why? For motor oil we have a huge wealth of information in the form of used analysis reports on this web site. People tried thicker oils than recommended, thinner than recommended, conventional, synthetic, etc mix different oil.. we get to see a lot of those results, but not so much for different ATF, so I prefer to play it safe with ATF.
 
I used Mercon V from the dealer when I serviced my mother's vehicle with 145,000 miles on the FF. That was months ago and the car is fine.

Used ML in my GM. Four days later I needed a new transmission.

ML is sewage. Use what your OM says to use.
 
Originally Posted By: Oil Changer
I used Mercon V from the dealer when I serviced my mother's vehicle with 145,000 miles on the FF. That was months ago and the car is fine.

Used ML in my GM. Four days later I needed a new transmission.

ML is sewage. Use what your OM says to use.


Guess my wifes Armada and my Camry didn't read your postings. Shhh!! Don't let them know.

Seriously, sorry you had an issue with the ML. I get your virepoint. Re-stating it in the same post multiple times serves, at least it does for me, to discredit what your saying.
 
Could be pure nonsense, but I read on another forum that Mer V is soon to be no longer made and the newer Mer LV IIRC will take over for previous Mer V applications. I asked Valvoline tech line why they didn't promote the Mer V on the bottle and was told Mer V is being phased out and hense only the Mer LV on the bottle.

I've asked lots of questions about ML in a Mer V application. Answers are all over the place.
cry.gif
Looks like I'm going to be a guniea pig of sorts as I believe I'll be giving it a shot in Spring.
 
I don't care. Someone will Google Maxlife or Valvoline, stumble across my post and possibly buy something else. Mission accomplished.

Originally Posted By: BISCUT
Originally Posted By: Oil Changer
I used Mercon
V from the dealer when I serviced my mother's vehicle with 145,000 miles on the FF. That was months ago and the car is fine.

Used ML in my GM. Four days later I needed a new transmission.

ML is sewage. Use what your OM says to use.


Guess my wifes Armada and my Camry didn't read your postings. Shhh!! Don't let them know.

Seriously, sorry you had an issue with the ML. I get your virepoint. Re-stating it in the same post multiple times serves, at least it does for me, to discredit what your saying.
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted By: bmwtechguy
145k miles on factory fluid fill is a problem waiting to happen.


I hear you. That's why I'm glad I swapped it out for fresh factory Ford Mercon. It's been a couple months. I check it once a week. Pretty pink and no problems, unlike my faillure using MaxLife.
 
I just did my first transmission flush on my Focus and was wondering the same question.

M1 ATF is $8, while Castrol Mercon V was $6. I have heard good things about the Castrol Mercon V, and went with 6 quarts of that, and saved myself $12.
 
Originally Posted By: antiqueshell
I'm still waiting to hear from the Valvoline fanboi club why they haven't put in writing that MaxLife ATF meets Honda DW1 spec....


How are a bunch of internet experts supposed to know when or if Valvoline is going to add a spec to a bottle? Some of the axe-grinding on here is getting pretty silly.

You don't like MaxLife, we get that. Move on with your life. If you're so interested in when they will add a specification to the bottle, why don't you call them and ask? Nobody here but you seems to be worried about this.
 
Originally Posted By: Hokiefyd
Originally Posted By: antiqueshell
I'm still waiting to hear from the Valvoline fanboi club why they haven't put in writing that MaxLife ATF meets Honda DW1 spec....


How are a bunch of internet experts supposed to know when or if Valvoline is going to add a spec to a bottle? Some of the axe-grinding on here is getting pretty silly.

You don't like MaxLife, we get that. Move on with your life. If you're so interested in when they will add a specification to the bottle, why don't you call them and ask? Nobody here but you seems to be worried about this.
11.gif
 
Originally Posted By: Hokiefyd

You don't like MaxLife, we get that. Move on with your life. If you're so interested in when they will add a specification to the bottle, why don't you call them and ask? Nobody here but you seems to be worried about this.


The question is why are you so offended by my inquiries?

After all you started a thread that stated that Valvoline MaxLife meets Honda DW1. Yes?
smirk.gif
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted By: antiqueshell
The question is why are you so offended by my inquiries?

After all you started a thread that stated that Valvoline MaxLife meets Honda DW1. Yes?
smirk.gif



Your inquiries aren't offensive to me at all. I'm suggesting to you that you could have had your answer many days ago by calling Valvoline instead of cross-posting the same question in multiple threads on an internet message board. We've all read your question (at least once). Obviously, nobody here has the answer. You can consume the board's bandwidth by continuing to post the same stuff...or if you have a legitimate question for Valvoline, you can call them and get the answer you appear to be seeking.
 
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