rx300leo

Thank you.

I'd be curious to see those results as well. lenore, which brand of the Synthetic you used. I am considering Lucas, Red Line or Mobil one? Guys, thank you for the answer, but the question was about front and rear differentials, so it was about gear oil. Which brand did you use for that? I knew that Amsoil has a compatible ATF to meet Toyota Type IV fluids specs.....was not aware of M1 having one now however. I thought this was a question on conventional vs. Synthetic diff fluids? I installed Castrol Syntec 75w90 (meets GL-5 classification) in my wife's 2003 Subaru Forester for both the F & R diffs.......never had a problem before on conventional, but it's even slightly quieter now that I put the synthetic in. What does your owners manual say to use? B)

Would you please advice if there is any benefit of using synthetic gear oil for front and rear differentials (may be just longer service) on RX300 AWD vs traditional oil. While I was on a long business trip, my wife brought the car to a dealer for a very small unrelated issue and asked this question (as she new I was planning to do it). The answer was that Lexus does not reccomend the synthetic oil (which does not make any technical sence to me). What is your opinion. Would the synthetic gear oil make it easy on the transmission? I would appreciate your answer.

Would you please send me a copy osetleo@yahoo.com Thank you.

All the nuts and bolts, drain and fill plugs, etc. of a Toyota / Lexus are METRIC sizes You are correct, it should be. So, it is loose 24mm for front differential. I could not get a good grip on a drain plug with my 24mm open wrench either. Need to get a tighter wrench.

Did you have any issues mixing the synthetic gear oil with left offs of regular gear oil, when you changed it for the first time?

Glad you get more ATF out. I forgot to mention that you can also drain out old ATF from in the cooler itself but I think you may do the obvious by opening up the return line. This method is actually posted on Amsoil's web site. See step 13 in page 2 http://www.amsoil.com/faqs/ATF_and_Filter_..._Procedures.pdf Have you tried to shift gears when the car is running, or just left it in "p"? The front differential drain plug is the hardest to get off. I used 15/16 Craftsman open wrench and patiently wedge it to catch the drain plug. Toyota does not leave any space so be careful not to strip the relative soft alloy plug in the process. You can buy a suction gun at Autozone for about $8-10, the type that has a clear plastic tube, dip the tube into your fresh gear oil to draw it in, get under the car and pump it into the fill plug. You need 10" extension and a 15/16 socket to loosen the fill plug, and make sure you can loosen it BEFORE you drain out the old fluid. Rear differential for AWD uses 10mm fill and drain plugs, you can use L shaped allen wrench or a craftsman socket with 10mm hex end. I started shifting gears when I connected the oil cooler line back and had nearly refilled (just below cold marks) transmission. Thank you for the tips on differentials. I will check the wrench at Sears. I read your previous posts and you mentioned you used a synthetic gear oil. Was there any reason to change? Or you did not want to get to that nusty drain plug more frequently?

I would like to thank everyone who gave me advice on my previous post "RX300 Oil Cooler". Today I change the transmission oil by disconnecting the return line from the oil cooler. Special thanks to TunedRX300 for the procedure technique. There was one surprise on this task. When I came to the local Toyota dealer he said that T-IV is in short supply in our area as all Lexus owners are buying it ( I was really encouraged by his comment). So, I was able to get 8 last bottles. When I drained oil from the transmission pan and the transfer box I got 5 quarts, then I filled it with 4 quarts, disconnected the return from the oil cooler, and started the engine. I got the reddish fluid after I drained approximately 1.7 quarts. With this method I obviously worried that having 8 quarts may not be very safe to drain a lot and was watching carefully for the color change. I was a little dissapointed that at least 2 something quarts of old oil were still hiding somewhere, but was glad I had enough to replaced drained oil. Next time I do transmission oil job I will think if I will go with this method (for ~2 additional quarts) or will do just drain from the pan and transfer box. It will take just no time. Beinng under the car I looked at the front and rare differential. My 15/16 wrench was too thick to grab the drain plug of the front differential. I will need to get a new wrench for it and get the gear oil pump. Would you please advise on the pump and may be on the wrench. Thank you.

I guess, I am confused with holes "One fill hole to fill transfer case and tranny even though there are two drain plugs". One hole to fill ATF and the same to fill gear oil??? Tranny dip stick fill hole fills tranny and transfer case. Drain tranny with its drain plug, 6" behind there is another drain plug to drain transfer case. Both drain plugs are opened with 10mm allen wrench. If you put fresh ATF into the tranny dip stick hole, it will goes into both transfer case and tranny. Similiar to rear differential , front differential uses gear oil, it has its own fill hole and drain plug, 15/16 six point plugs. Thank you.

I guess, I am confused with holes "One fill hole to fill transfer case and tranny even though there are two drain plugs". One hole to fill ATF and the same to fill gear oil???

Thank you. I was thinking to use the drain and fill strategy each 15K. My friend did it at a dealer at 15 and 30K and I have 50K now. I will do it for 2/3 consercutive times during a week some time next week. I am kind of afraid of flashing to introduce something else into this tranny. Besides, I have to find somebody to do it and I hate when I can't do it myself (my wife uses all bad words for this idi...tic habit, but I actually like it). What do you think about this approach? Thanks. Drain and fill is the proven method, but you can drain only about 4.3 quarts. If you think about it, doing 2-3 drain and fill in a row will drain out some of the fresh ATF you just poured into the tranny. Also it does not replace all old fluid. Open return line from the tranny cooler to drain and fill fresh fluid through the fill hole is using RX300's own ATF circulating mechanism, not using some machine to force flush in and vacuum fluid out. You can get most of the tranny fluid out in the first shot. If this method hurts the tranny, why would Toyota design the tranny cooler, which is by design circulating ATF in and out? Some will swear drain and fill is the only way, some will say flush with machine. Think and decide, it is your car. Just my $0.02 Thank you everyone for your input and your time to write a respond. I really appreciate it. TunedRX300, I like your approach to open the return like from the cooler and drain it as well. However, I have couple of questions on this method. When your recconect the return line back to the coller and start the ATF filling (from the check plug, I assume) can you introduce some air pockets to the ATF system? They probably have a recirculating pump at the lowest point which creates some minimum pressure to push the liquid through the cooler. This pump is probably lubricated with the same ATF. Do you think there may be some condition that this pump will run dry (it will just push all the new ATF to the cooler). Because you don't want to overfill the pan with 6-7 quarts, I guess, to kind of prevent this. Please let me know what do you think on this subject. Also, I checked the car records from my friend, the previous owner and found that when he was twice doing this procedure at the dealer (Fremont, Bay Area), they charged him only for 4 quarts of ATF. That obviously means they have not done the drain this way. Were they lazy (which is possible) or they followed the procedure and there is a reason for that. Thank you again. The pump won't run dry since you drain from the return line to the cooler and add from the tranny filler hole at about the same time: add one quart when one quart is drained. That is after you drained 4.3 quarts of old ATF from regular transfer case and tranny drain plugs and fill with fresh ATF. In another word, you got 4.3 quarts of fresh ATF in those pans to be drawn to the pump and use RX's own circulating mechanism to pump out the old ATF remains in Torque Convertor. Stop when you see ATF color change at the drain point. Again nothing invasive and if you think about it, how can it stir up old sludges in the tranny? The main goal of replacing the ATF is to replace old fluid with fresh fluid. Makes little sense to drain out fresh fluid (expensive T-IV!) and still not getting most of old fluid out. Just my $0.02 again. Thank you. I will consider it. I think the transfer case (front differential) has a hypoid oil, not ATF. They are coupled mechanically, not hydrolically.

At what mileage you did the timing belt? I honesly hope to do it myself. I have done it on Nissan Maxima V6 and Camry 4. Has anyone done it on RX300? How is filling oil into differentials. Is it tricky to get it filled? I have pretty big hands.

Thanks, although I am not sure I have warranty on this transmission any more. It is 99RX300AWD with only 50k mikes on it. They will not take repair until it fails (it is still running without any noticable problems) and it will happen after the 7 year warranty expires (law of luck). Is it possible Toyota fixed the problem on the replacement transmission you got and only original have it? Although, I agree, it should be a shame for the company like Toyota to have transmission failure on that many cars (it feels like on all) and not acknowledge it to their customers.

Thank you. I was thinking to use the drain and fill strategy each 15K. My friend did it at a dealer at 15 and 30K and I have 50K now. I will do it for 2/3 consercutive times during a week some time next week. I am kind of afraid of flashing to introduce something else into this tranny. Besides, I have to find somebody to do it and I hate when I can't do it myself (my wife uses all bad words for this idi...tic habit, but I actually like it). What do you think about this approach? Thanks. Drain and fill is the proven method, but you can drain only about 4.3 quarts. If you think about it, doing 2-3 drain and fill in a row will drain out some of the fresh ATF you just poured into the tranny. Also it does not replace all old fluid. Open return line from the tranny cooler to drain and fill fresh fluid through the fill hole is using RX300's own ATF circulating mechanism, not using some machine to force flush in and vacuum fluid out. You can get most of the tranny fluid out in the first shot. If this method hurts the tranny, why would Toyota design the tranny cooler, which is by design circulating ATF in and out? Some will swear drain and fill is the only way, some will say flush with machine. Think and decide, it is your car. Just my $0.02 Thank you everyone for your input and your time to write a respond. I really appreciate it. TunedRX300, I like your approach to open the return like from the cooler and drain it as well. However, I have couple of questions on this method. When your recconect the return line back to the coller and start the ATF filling (from the check plug, I assume) can you introduce some air pockets to the ATF system? They probably have a recirculating pump at the lowest point which creates some minimum pressure to push the liquid through the cooler. This pump is probably lubricated with the same ATF. Do you think there may be some condition that this pump will run dry (it will just push all the new ATF to the cooler). Because you don't want to overfill the pan with 6-7 quarts, I guess, to kind of prevent this. Please let me know what do you think on this subject. Also, I checked the car records from my friend, the previous owner and found that when he was twice doing this procedure at the dealer (Fremont, Bay Area), they charged him only for 4 quarts of ATF. That obviously means they have not done the drain this way. Were they lazy (which is possible) or they followed the procedure and there is a reason for that. Thank you again.

Thank you. I was thinking to use the drain and fill strategy each 15K. My friend did it at a dealer at 15 and 30K and I have 50K now. I will do it for 2/3 consercutive times during a week some time next week. I am kind of afraid of flashing to introduce something else into this tranny. Besides, I have to find somebody to do it and I hate when I can't do it myself (my wife uses all bad words for this idi...tic habit, but I actually like it). What do you think about this approach? Thanks.

Guys, I am new on this board and read today your comments on the transmission issues with RX300 AWD. I bought this car 3 month ago from my friend for my wife to drive to work and for us to go skiing as a substitution of Camry Wagon, V6. For the first time we went to the mountains (Tahoe area) after Christmas and I wanted to share how dissapointed I am with its performance in the mountains. It is so much underpowered. No wonder (what should I expect) the same as Camry engine and nearly 1.5 times heavier. But I got really shocked today when I read about all transmission issues. When my wife came home from work I immediately went and check the status of the transmission fluid and was looking for a transmission oil cooler as well. I could not find it under the hood and decided to look for it later ( I have a fever and am taking easy now) under the car. I still have the original list of car features and it says it has the touring preparation package w/Tranmission Oil Cooler. Would you please advise where to look for it. Thank you.