Differential Fluid change

[Jon11582]

Changed the ATF today, without a hitch. I noticed the Haynes manual said to change the differential oil too on the Toyota model. I assume you need to drain it from the bottom and fill from the "filler hole".

How do you fill it from the fillter hole? Do you need to repeatedly use a siphon? I think its at a vertical so a funnel wouldnt really work. This is for a 4cyl, and I think the Differential on a 5SFE is a bit diff from the 1MZ, but any help would be cool.

[JAYDEE23]

shoot i read how to do it in the manual i have but forget..just get it in there somehow till it starts pouring out..then you know your full..doesnt list how to do it in the manual?

[toy4x4boy]

You can buy a little hand pump that you fill with the oil and pump it in (has a flexible hose attached to it) and I also think they make pumps that screw on to the end of the bottle.

[Jai_Jai_Binks]

How do you fill it from the fillter hole? Do you need to repeatedly use a siphon?

its not easy (very messy with that filler hole sideways). I wait for 79.99 deals at the stealerships (flush's, not drain and fills). Got my 5sfe with fresh tranny juices this year for that price.

[Jon11582]

How do you fill it from the fillter hole? Do you need to repeatedly use a siphon?

its not easy (very messy with that filler hole sideways). I wait for 79.99 deals at the stealerships (flush's, not drain and fills). Got my 5sfe with fresh tranny juices this year for that price.

Tranny was easy enough. Its just this seperate differential. Why couldnt they make a filler from the engine compartment like for the tranny?

I think I'm down for the handpump. Should be fun pumping 1.7 quarts of liquid by hand. I'll get it flushed next time around.

[toy4x4boy]

Pumping 1.7 qts is easy. Try pumping at least 12 which I did when I changed all the fluids out in my 4x4 Toyota.

[noodlerooney]

I also have a 1994 Camry 5SFE, and for the diff I used Mobil1 DexIII synthetic since the fluid is trapped and is not put thru the cooler. At $5/qt, it was too expensive and car too old to use in the whole transmission. Used my brake bleeder pump system to fill until runs out of filler hole freely. Make sure you can remove the filler plug before you drain it !!!

[impactX]

V6 doesn't need it.

[srhydro1]

I'm not sure about newer Solara's, but the 2000 V6 (I own one) DOES need a differential change. Just finished changing the tranny and differential fluids this afternoon, in preparation for the winter season. Takes 1.7 qts of Dexron III (I used Mobil 1 synthetic) that you must pump in using a suction tool (about $8 at Autozone) that you use in reverse. The problem is that the fill hole is vertical and is so small you have to buy a tubing adapter (the standard suction tool's tubing is too large to go in the fill hole) at Home Depot (or elsewhere) to use very small diameter tubing. But, if you only drained your tranny when you changed fluid, you only did half of the job. Change the differential, its very easy, once you have the right tool.

[noodlerooney]

That's strange, I have a 2000 SLE V6 and the differential just has a drain plug, no fill plug, it fills from the transmission ie transmission fluid dipstick. There are several small bolts in the area, but I think these are ports to check transmission fluid pressures. I was confused the first time too, but the stealership techs did confirm that the diff fills from the tranny.

[bassthrive]

That's strange, I have a 2000 SLE V6 and the differential just has a drain plug, no fill plug, it fills from the transmission ie transmission fluid dipstick. There are several small bolts in the area, but I think these are ports to check transmission fluid pressures. I was confused the first time too, but the stealership techs did confirm that the diff fills from the tranny.

ditto

[srhydro1]

the fill port is a small bolt (12mm) on the back side of the differential, about 6-inches above the drain plug. The bolt faces to the rear of the car, unlike the other hold down bolts. You know you have the right one because when you remove it you will find that it has a small rubber o-ring to keep it from leaking. I drained exactly 52 oz. (which is about 1.4 qts) from my V-6 solara but it was a bitch to refill (I think the manual says 1.7 qts, but thats dry). Had to temporarily use silicone to "glue" the small diameter tubing in the bolt hole overnight so that I could refill it using pressure the next day.(the fluid wanted to come out of the hole, rather than in when I first tried to fill without sealing the tubing). The fill hole is very small. There is no way they are connected like the dealer says, since my tranny still read full on the dipstick after draining the 52 oz. from the differential. I will say that it was a real pain to fill, and unless you really need to do the job because you drive the car hard, forget it. Just drain and refill the tranny which, by the way, only takes about 2.75 qts. of fluid to fill after you drain it (not even close to the 5.0 qts the owners manual says it takes).
Hope this helps>

[Jon11582]

Well I guess I should throw an update since this thread keeps getting bumped.

I didnt change the diff fluid, just tranny. I guess lazyness got the best of me. I'm only at 62K so its not bad yet and if I still need to change it, I can.

Now...my question. Whats the worst thing that can happen as a result of having old diff fluid in your system? Are there any warning signs?

BTW, I think I read in my haynes manual I think that the Camry types (Camry, Solara, Avalon) V6 and I4s all have a seperate Diff fluid pool, except for the ES300 for whatever reason. I dont remember for sure, so dont quote me on that.

[CASTRO]

hmmm so there still seems to be a lot of confusion about the transmission fill/drain. I have a v6 auto.... from the looks of it, I have that same extra tranny drain bolt facing the rear of the car, in addition to the regular downward facing trannyoil drain bolt. I've drained/refilled the tranny about 4-5 times until it was clean. Does that change out the fluid for the differential too? I dont wanna take out that mystery bolt and have crap fall w/o knowing what it does.

[srhydro1]

Well first off, I owe impactX and noodlerooey a sincere apology. Last night, after reading noodlerooey's post (as well as my own), I started to second guess myself. What if the technical writers who wrote the owners manual screwed up and the total fluid change was 5 qts, including the 1.7 qts in the differential?. So I measured the tranny - full, and then drained the differential (about 1.5 qts), siliconed in the small diameter tubing in the fill plug, and went to bed (to allow the silicone seal to cure). This morning I checked the tranny level and, low and behold, it appeared to be down about 0.75 inches from the previous day (hard to tell since you smear fluid on the fill tube each time you remove the dipstick). I then pumped 52 ounces of fluid into the differential using a peristaltic pump (much easier than the suction tool, but I realize most won't have access to this kind of pump), checked the fluid level in the tranny, still about 0.75 inches low, turned the engine on, ran the car through the gears, and YES the fluid had risen about 0.75 inches to the pre-drain level. Apparently, the connection between the tranny and differential is poor, unless the engine is running (I guess thats why they want you to have the engine on when you check the level of the tranny. So, at least with my car (2000, SLE V6) the tranny and the differential are connected.

Does it make a difference not to drain the differential? Its your guess, but since in my case) it contains about 35% of the fluid, why dilute the new fluid with that much old fluid? In the future, the procedure for my car will be to pull the plugs on both the tranny and differential, wait about 0.5 hours, put the plugs back in, refill the tranny with about 4 qts of fluid, fire up the engine, run through the gears (to get the fluid into the differential), and then top off the tranny with about another pint of fluid.

Again, I apologize to both impactX and noodlerooney (you were correct) and to the others I may have confused, what do you expect from a newbie?:)