AT Transmission Filter Kit

I just bought my Tacoma with 103k miles on it. I've read on here not to do the tranny flush so I'm going to replace the filter. I checked at Advanced Auto Parts and they have a Beck/Arnley kit for $40... which is much cheaper than places I saw online.

Does anyone have experience with this kit and replacing the filter?

http://www.partsamerica.com/ProductDetail.aspx?MfrCode=BAR&MfrPartNumber=0440307

Thanks!

 

Why would you not want to flush it and put some fresh fluid in??? I am @ 50,000 miles now and plan on doing this @ 60,000 miles.

 

I went to the toyota dealership yesterday to pick up some AT fluid b/c someone on one of the forums said I needed Type T-IV. I asked one of the veteran service guys and he showed me that there would be a white ring on the AT dipstick if I needed Type T-IV. He also showed me where Dextron III is printed on the dipstick so I picked up some Castrol on sale at Advanced Auto Parts.

I asked about the tranny filter and he said not to worry about it. He said that he's never seen a screen clogged before and I could just clean it with brake fluid. He recommended that I drain/refill once a month for a few months and that would get me clean. I'm still going to drop the filter to take a look at it and clean it.

As for the flush debate, check out this post on CustomTacos.com.
http://customtacos.com/forum/showthread.php?t=96411

 

I did the job last Friday and everything went fine. First I drove up on ramps and drained out the transmission fluid then reinstalled the drain plug. Then I took out the 18 screws holding it up and used a paint scraper to carefully pry the corners to break the gasket seal. (Be very careful because it's easy to put indentions in the transmission case.) While I held up the pan, my friend removed the screw holding the dipstick tube bracket. There was still some fluid in the AT pan so I drained it after removing the pan from under my truck. I then removed the AT filter which unexpectedly poured out fluid some leftover fluid on us.

The filter wasn't clogged and there were no visible holes, so I used a rag to clean off the outside and sprayed some brake fluid to wash out the inside. (I recommend WearEver BF at Advanced Auto Parts - stuff works great!) Toyota used RTV sealant to make the original gasket so we had to carefully scrape it off the pan and AT case. (I didn't have any gasket remover unfortunately.) Then I cleaned out the inside of the pan with brake fluid to get it spotless before reinstalling it with a rubber gasket from Advanced.

I was worried about metal shavings in the pan since I had read the drain plug didn't have a magnet on it, but I was pleasantly surprised that there are 3 magnets on the bottom of the pan! They are spread out to catch everything - you can see wear they are located if you look at the square indentions on the bottom off the pan.

All in all it was a pretty painless job and I measured a little over 6qts that I drained out.