Transmission 2016-2023- 6 SPEED AUTOMATICS COULD BE LOW ON FLUID DIRECTLY FROM FACTORY

Thanks again to Gearcruncher for your hard work. I've read the entire thread on low trans fluid, and now that I am aware of this issue I am going to get to work. First a call to Toyota Corporate. I'm going to wait and see what they say before I do my own check on the fluid level. Hopefully the selling dealer will be cooperative?

Yesterday I had my truck up on my drive on lift. I took the time to R&R the heat shield and de-burr the edge. Three 10 mm nuts and off it comes. Much more room to see and work.
While it was off I took these snaps. I hope that that will clarify for others where the plugs are.

I know it has been addressed some but, it seems to me that a infrared thermometer would save a hassle, and using a second person in the truck to report the temperature range. The pan temp and the fluid temp can't be that different, time wise. So I'll pin it, measure the temp, and add until it pukes a little. That's what I plan to do unless I get dealer support.
Any body see a disaster with this?

Also my u-bolts were not very tight. I didn't measure but they were around 35 ft. pds. I took them up to 55.
The rear and front diff's were OK with the fluid.
I've already greased the drive zerks several times.

Charles

 

@gearcruncher
Thanks for all this info! Picking up my '17 TRD OR next week in Calgary. Dealer is saying fluids would have been changed as part of PDI - is there a way I can confirm this?

I just want to make sure I start out on the right side of proactive maintenance.


Also, is there a way for Canadian's to access the Toyota Owners? When I enter the VIN it wants a US Zip...

 

Rocky.Mtn

This is all we get in Canada
https://www.toyota.ca/toyota/en/my-toyota/recalls

 

Long time listen first time caller...hahaha had to say that.

I would just simply like to say you guys rock. Wealth of information. My 2017 tacoma was definitely low in transmission fluid. After trying to get the dealership to do the right thing. They lied to me and told me that they had physically done a fluid check. Well i guess they neglected to notice the dash camera because after reviewing the recordings all they did was joy ride it a bit and possibly scanned it. At no point was it placed on the lift and checked. Flat out lied to me when i asked them if they had physically checked the fluid. I brought this to their attention just minutes after leave, and all they had to say was well sorry. I did get a few quarts of transmission fluid for free out of them so I guess looking on the bright side...
I was able to get the transmission into temp mode and add the much needed fluid to my truck with 3200 miles on it.
All I want so say is thank you brothers for your time and effort to help the rest of us out. Solidarity !

 

Care to share who this dealer is?

 

It's amazing just how many come low on fluids

 

How true !
Thats why I started the poll

 

Well the dealership has contacted me at toyota's request. I informed the service manager that when I performed the fluid check i found what looks like glitter!! in the transmission fluid. He said he would contact the master technician from toyota that just happened to be in the area and would call me back. The service manager from the dealership called me back and said the Toyota master tech said thier should nothing in the fluid and wanted to remove the transmission pan himself. My concern is , is this a real thing a real person from toyota or just the service manager trying to pacify me and lie some more? Has anyone heard of an actual toyota employee looking at trucks. Not sure if i trust the dealership.

 

Glitter in the fluid is usually a sign of alluminum . Considering alluminum is non ferros , it has a tendency to float with fluid flow rather than stick to the magnets in the bottom of the pan .
Because of alluminums floating charecteristics , it works like sand paper throughout the transmission .
With this said , you are on warranty . If something is coming apart , dealerships swap out your transmission with a new unit . Catch the problem within the warranty .
If the master tech wants to inspect the fluid , the bottom of the pan and filter , I would be more than happy to let him peak at it . Make sure you have everything documented when he performs the service , However ,I would highly suggest using a different dealer after the fiasco you have been through . There are some top notch reputable dealers out there and then there are dealerships like the one you are involved with

 

Thank you for taking the time to do this...
Im considering a 3rd gen, and this opened my eyes to a problem that needs to be addressed.

 

Its a dealership in kansas city and I don't want to bad mouth a dealership if that makes sense. Bad service can happen anywhere.

 

Today, performed the check procedure, per the AC60F AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION FLUID ADJUSTMENT procedure. Based on what it said to do, or did not to do actually, I did not pin the thermostat open beforehand.

Felt a little stupid rapidly flipping the shifter between N and D, but the trick is to do just that: do it quickly! The "D" remained lit, and I proceeded to check the fluid. Removed the CHECK plug and only a few residual drips came out. For curiosity, I then let the truck run to see how much time passed before the "D" started blinking. It was about 5 minutes.

No noticeable problems with the way the truck drives. I only have a little over 500 miles on it. I won't be seeing any cold weather soon here in Phoenix, so I may never feel any sluggishness or hesitation. Question is, should I have the dealership check and fill based on some complaint or just do it myself? If doing it myself, I have no problem with it, and I will report back the amount it is low.

2017 Tacoma TRD Off-Road 4x4 with tow package. Hecho en Mexico, VIN starts with '3'

 

Reporting back...

Did you ever have one of those mornings where it seems that you can't do anything right...like you're extremely clumsy, everything feels awkward, and everything is frustrating despite having a plan ready to go the night before? Well, that was my morning!

Performed the test again this morning. I had to wait until the next day because the transmission was too hot last night; the 'D' was flashing. Started up the truck, did the odd-ball routine to check the oil, and had to wait about 3 minutes of idling to get the 'D' to appear. Proceeded to check and fill.

• Pulled check plug. A few drips as expected, same as before.
  
• Had the WS fill plug already loosened, but upon doing so, I hit my arm against the bottle of trans fluid so it partially spilled onto the garage floor. First clumsy oops!
  
• Unthreaded the WS fill plug and proceeded to pump in some oil.
• I don't recall the number of pumps it took, maybe 20 or so.
• Oil started to come out the bottom. A decent amount at first, then it slowed.
  
• Waited until it slowed to a thin, partially-dripping stream. The procedure states that the oil may never completely stop dripping out, as it expands due to it continuously warming up, so I decided to stop here.
• Reinstalled check plug.
  
• Proceeded to install the WS fill plug and cut my index finger twice, in the same spot, on the exhaust heat shield! Nice "paper" cut style slashes right under the fingernail. Lovely.

So between the small amount of fluid spilled from the bottle, and the amount pumped into the transmission, I would say it was low maybe 1/8 of a quart? Is that still considered to be low on oil? What do you guys think?

EDIT #1:
Being that it's such a small amount, I don't know if I can fully discredit the Toyota factory and/or the dealership. An error rate, or percentage off, is real-world.

However, the dealership should have done the same as me, i.e. upon first opening the check plug and observing just a few residual drops, immediately performing the rest of the check/fill procedure and adding that 1/8 quart until steady drips/thin stream is observed. After all, the fact that only the residual drips occurred when first checked, and not the steady drips/thin stream, would indicate a possible low-oil condition, right? Right! Overall...

If steady drips/thin stream, then level is OK. If no steady drips/thin stream, then proceed to fill.

If when I first cracked open the check plug and observed steady drips/thin stream, then it would have confirmed the dealership did what they were supposed to do.

The check-oil procedure is overly complicated but fool-proof, IMO. It was time consuming, as I'm not a trained mechanic, and furthermore I was unfamiliar with the procedure having not repeated it more than a couple times. Toyota may have dropped the ball from the start, but I can understand why the dealerships opt not to do this procedure, especially if they're a large-volume seller.

EDIT #2:
After thinking about it a little more, the volume of oil I added probably equals the amount taken up by the trans cooler and applicable hoses. The transmission probably was filled correctly to the proper amount, but additional oil was not added after the factory hooked up the trans cooler.

 

Hmm...I guess this thread is pretty much dead?

 

Not dead !!
We are still here .
Reading and observing new posts all the time .
If you have a steady drip , you performed the fill procedure correctly

 

Took my 2017 TRD Offroad into the dealership 3 weeks ago for the 6 month initial service interval.

At the time I had 4,000 miles on the truck and while they were “checking fluid levels and rotating the tires”, I mentioned that I had been noticing the following:
1. Transmission not wanting to upshift when coasting down a hill and engine breaking essentially up into the 4000 RPM range which seemed pretty odd for an automatic
2. I also noticed hard shifts going from Drive to Reverse
3. When slowing down to come to a stop at a stop sign or a red light, the transmission would essentially slip it felt like, in that that it would shift down but late and lurch forward while I was still breaking and almost coming to a stop.

The dealership had me make a separate appointment to bring it in so they could keep it for the day and let the tranny cool down to check the oil level.
Well I did just that and made an appointment for the following Saturday morning at 7am. I brought it down there and dropped it off. They called me back in the afternoon about 30 minutes to close and told me they were going to have to hold it until Monday as hey needed to call Toyota Corporate per some new procedure that was just put into place that has to do with the low transmission fluid check as of that Friday before (9/15).

Well I wasn’t pleased as I saw it going down the same difficult road that many others have gone down on this forum while simply just trying to get the dealerships to check the tranny fluid level.

Come Monday, I heard back and they told me they spoke to Toyota Corporate and that they will need to test drive the truck to see if they can duplicate what I reported. They explained that Toyota is now requiring that I come in and test drive the truck while it is hooked up to their computer system and a technician rides along with me and note whenever I feel the issue so they can note when it occurred in their diagnostic test and observe.

Thus, we did just that and of course on the short route we went I couldn’t get the truck to do what it typically does when I slow up to a stop as explained above, but I was able to get it to do the hard shift when going from D to R and the downhill engine brake described above. The technician stated that this was normal for the truck. We finished the few mile loop and went back to the dealership.

I explained that I would please like them to check the transmission level. They said they would report back to Toyota and would follow the step process per a paper procedure they showed to me which included checking the tranny fluid level. This paper procedure was supposedly part of Toyota’s new process for handling this issue.

The next day they called me to inform me that the “TRANSMISSION LEVEL WAS HALF A QUART LOW”, go figure!!

I was very admimant from the beginning that I wanted them to check the tranny level and had to go through all of that just to find out that it was in fact low.

Anyway, it’s partially good to see that Toyota apparently has noticed the issue becoming a common problem and has devised a procedure for dealing with the issue. However, we are all still driving around for thousands of miles and breaking in our trucks with low tranny fluid...causeing who knows what damage.

Maybe we are closer to a resolution but it seems Toyota is at least taking note and the issue is common enough that they had to develop a protocal for handling it, if this dealer was truthful and accurate.

@gearcruncher I’m thinking of calling Toyota Corporate and discussing the state of my tranny further in regards to the low fluid level. Though it wasn’t as low as others on here, I do notice the same tendencies in regards to my transmission as I did before the fluid being topped off, though they are much less common and I noticed an immediate improvement over what I was feeling prior to the fluid being topped off. I’m also thinking I should request that Toyota Corporate have the dealer drain the fluid and check for any metal pieces and refill it with fresh oil. Thoughts? Anything else?

Thanks! Hopefully this helps others. Not sure if anyone else has experienced this new “procedure” or “protocal” that I did.

I completed the poll above as well.

 

Thanks for the update etozz221

I would like to see what is involved with this new protocal ?
Got any paper work that proves your fluid level was checked manually ?
I agree that you should convince the dealer to pop the pan off the trans and check for damage . Its the least they can do for you . Perhaps extend your warranty ? I would fight for a longer warranty for sure .
Too many new trucks driving around low on trans fluid .
In 2018 , maybe Toyota will start checking the fluid level before the truck is sold to the buyer
Unfortunately and according to the poll , 243 members including you had low fluid . You guys essentially plowed the way for the new protocal

 

Thanks for the confirmation, Gearcruncher! Given the relatively low amount of oil (about 1/8 qt) I added, would you declare that as being low? I have not yet voted.

Etozz, does your truck have the tow package?

 

Yes it does, why do you ask?

 

Hay I have a 2017 Tacoma 4/ 6 speed auto ,shifts hard when cold and down shifts hard at times ,dealer and field etc says this is typical ??