[John Ellis]

Hi, I’m John from MD and this is my first post. I have an 07 Tundra Crewmax with 185k miles. It runs well but I’m starting to be concerned about the transmission. Since it doesn’t have a dip stick to check, should I have it drained and filled or keep driving?

I have heard that the drain/ fill may result in problems, with so many miles. I have seen others that got several 100k miles, what kind of maintenance did they do to keep the transmission going?

Thanks in advance.

 

[310z]

Well, I would hope the fluid has been changed a few times with 185k miles. However, if you are not having any transmission problems you will not have anything different occur with just a fluid change. Have the fluid drained and refilled. The transmission pan must be dropped to drain the fluid and change the filter. The fluid has to be pumped back into the transmission as there is no dip stick/fill tube. There are youtube vidieo to describ this. This will not remove all of the fluid from the transmission as the fluid in the torque converter will not get drained. But it does start to dilute the old fluid with fresh fluid. Then I would go back and have the fluid and filter changed again in 5000-10,000 miles and hopefully the the filter has trapped all of what is needed to be picked up in the fluid. Then 50,000 mile transmission fluid changes from then on.

OR
You could go to a Toyota dealer and they will flush out the system so all of the old fluid is removed and new fluid is replaced. There are many problems reported with the Toyota Transmission flushes although there is much skepticism as to what the real issue is. What makes the most since is that the owners claiming a transmission problem post flushing already had transimission codes showing up prior to the flush. Then transmission system and the problem became worse post flushing.

I had that exact situation described to me by a Toyota Master Tech when I had transmission codes. The system was flushed and with in 5000 miles I replaced my transmission. Now I have my fluid and filter changed every 50,000 miles.

 

[Skinnygeek95]

With the enclosed transmission on a tundra, you change transmission fluid every 60,000 miles. Alittle different from a normal car changing transmission fluid regularly at 30,000 miles.
As for having problems afterwards, I haven’t had any problems personally. (2012 iforce v8) my brother has a 2013 and got his changed at a Toyota dealer and had that problem afterwards. The truck was sputtering as many people call it when they have this issue. The problem was, the error of the mechanic. He left the engine cap alittle off and was taking too much air into the intake. So they say. Can’t always trust dealers, they’re either amateurs or they’re not. Apparently in my bros situation… duh.

 

[Blenton]

I would do a drain and refill, not a complete flush. Drain and fill replaces about 1/4 of the fluid in transmission; IMO it is much safer than a flush especially if the service history is in question. I’ve done the same type of procedure on several of my own vehicles that had high miles and unknown service histories. On my tundra, I bought it new and have done drain and fill every 30k per the manual since it tows and hauls regularly.

The procedure itself is simple but must be strictly adhered to.

 

[H2O MAN]

I bought my '07 a little over 5 years ago when it had 270,000 miles and no service history. We performed a drain and fill, and the Toyota Mechanic performed a transmission shift memory reset because it was having trouble deciding if it should be in first or second during gradual acceleration after a stop or near stop. Everything is working as it should today with 308,000

 

[dphilli45]

I've done 3 drain and fills in 1 day on my 2020 at about 15k will do 1 more at 30k and then it will be every 30k thereafter. This is a little overkill as you really only need to do it every 50k but I like to keep my maintenance intervals stricter than what the OM suggests. That way I feel I can't go wrong.