Hello, I know, I have been putting off changing the transaxle fluid on my 2007 gen 2 Prius. And now after reading some other posts, some people say it can loosen the metal particles floating around in the transaxle and cause problems. Can anyone advise me on going ahead and changing the fluid at 134,000 miles? Thank you! Marvinh
What posts said that? Never heard that on this forum. Any loose metallic particles will be picked up by the magnetic drain bolt. Make sure you clean it off. If you think your having gear wear issues one trick is to dump the fluid in a wide container and put it in the sun. You will easily see any non ferrous debris floating in the fluid. Ferrous metal will be picked up by the magnet. New fluid will only help its basically a manual gearbox. I've changed mine like 3 times already.
If you had a normal automatic transmission, then the hydraulic shift logic might possibly suffer from what you mention, in some unlikely scenario. A Prius has no hydraulic shift logic, in part because it never shift gears. (It also tends to be electric where other cars would not) If your Prius had these snakey little passages, it is remotely possible a fluid change could block one. It doesn't. Do the change.
edited for clarity: Please change the WS fluid in the transaxle Getting the waterpump and steering column recall work done. Should I get anything else done? | PriusChat
I read that, and no one is spreading the old wives tale about fluid changes being bad for automatics in it.
Let me apologize all around. It could be time for me to get another eye exam. Somehow I skipped over the part 'it can loosen', which made it read like the OP was asking if they should change the fluid or not. Please change the WS fluid, the original owner of my 07 never changed the fluid and the transaxle blew up around 100k.