Is 15,000 mi. too soon to change???
 

I just want to know if I'm being paranoid. I will be taking my truck in to have my 15,000 mi. service.
I want to know if I should, just to be safe, change the tranny filter, oil and torq. converter while I am at it?

I have done primarily city driving, would it be a waste of money???

I think it's a little sooner than I would do it, but it certainly wouldn't hurt!

Mark

If you haven't been towing, then I believe you could wait. I changed mine at 25K and the fluid looked and smelled great.
My miles were a combination of city/highway with about 1K of it towing a car/trailer.

Couldn't hurt, I change mine on 15K intervals. One of the first things I do when I get a vehicle is put a shift kit in it and change the fluid. The torque convertors are easy to drain, which gives you a whole lot more clean oil. Might be a good time to switch to synthetics also. It might be overkill but I've never had tranny problems either.;)

I'm at 41,000 and have changed mine 3 times.

mercon v is a decent fluid that should last a minimum of 30k miles...i think it would be wasteful to change the tranny fluid before then...jmo.

My thanks to all! I have decided to change it at 15,000 mi. I want to switch to a synthetic ( Redline D4 ATF). It's going to be expensive but well worth it for the type of driving ( downshifting a lot) I do.

Thank you for all your imput. :)

In the FWIW department:

I'm following the 15K recommendations of one of the transmission's designers -- figuring he should know.

At the first change, I opened up the filter (simple matter of bending/breaking over the metal crimp with a vice-grip) and was pleasantly-surprized with the lack of metal shavings trapped in the seemingly-apt filter.

At the second change, the dealership did not save the filter for me.

At the third change, the filter was again opened -- with even cleaner results.

I baby the truck -- and have only towed approximately 3-500 miles with it (GCW=11500# with normal sized travel trailer) - and am considering the "dilution method" of change (where you suck out as much tranny fluid as you can thru the dipstic tube -- and merely refill with new) on a 6-month basis for an interim period of until 75,000 miles or so -- because the fulid/filter appeared so clean.

I have reservations as to the operation of the torque converter, however (doesn't stay locked up as I would have designed it) -- but I did notice a difference in shifting with each of the oil changes.

Unlike most of the people here on the board, I LIKE the silky-smooth shifting of this transmission -- and shift points are as though I had designed them myself!

I wish you luck -- now wish me luck, too, please.

hey y2k,

unfortunately the 4r70w isn' t nearly as smooth and smart as your 4r100...

my 1-2 upshift can be jarring...wish they would have put the 4r100 in every 5.4l truck they produce...:(

When Ford re-badged the F-250LD to become the F-150 7700, they put in the 4R70W in most -- mine is one. (ARrrrrrrrrrgh!)

According to Baumann Engineering, the 4R70W is the best transmission design that Ford makes and is the future of transmission design:

"The AOD-E/4R70W is the latest and best Ford performance transmission, and in our opinion, represents the foreseeable future of
performance rear-wheel-drive automatic transmission technology."

http://www.baumannengineering.com/aodefund.htm

y2k,

when you order an f150 with the 7700 lb gvwr, i thought the 4r100 was thrown in?? when you build the trucks on kbb.com website, that's what comes up. unfortunately, the supercrew doesn't have a heavy payload option and therefore is stuck with the 4r70w...