trans fluid and coolant mixing.

[wildcar]

So my radiator bit the dust on me this weekend and I noticed the trans fluid was really thin so when I checked my coolant I found out that it was draining with the trans fluid. Now I'm worried as hell about my transmission. I'm guessing that I should have the trans flushed and refilled and do the same for the engine coolant. Is there anything I can do to make sure that nothing is messed up?
I have over 230,xxx miles and it runs like a champ but I'm worried that this is gonna cause some problems for me.

 

[sant6236]

~

OK:

I had the same issue happen around 8 months ago.

I have a 2001 Toyota 4Runner and currently have 119,400 miles on it.

What year is yours?

Should you be concerned? Absoloutely, but understand that this is a very sensitive situation that needs TLC and there is hope.

I personally rear ended an individual, which resulted in a rutpured transmition cooler within the radiator. Once this occurs, coolant shoots into the tranny and its related components (torque converter, transfercase, etc.) and tranny fluid back into all of your cooling compoents (radiator, water pump, block, etc). More than likely this is exactly what has happened to yours, minus the accident.

What is the remedy?

~PARK YOUR RUNNER
~Time
~Patience
~Flushing the transmission
~Flushing your cooling system over and over and over(Flush until you cannot see oil residue in the overlow resevoir anymore)
~Adding Dr.Tranny after transmission is flushed (2 tubes is recommended and is available on Amazon for $6 a tube)

After the flushing takes place, especially within the tranny, the so called "gunk" that established a bond or holds the tranny compnents together loses its strength, hence the reason you need to re-establish this bond. Dr. Tranny does this.

Also, after this flushing, you will more than likely experience torque convert "shutter". I did, but it went away nearly instantaneously after using this stuff. It was truly amazing and I swear by it.

I have done posts on both the incident and the was Dr. Tranny has worked for me. You can search for them.

IMPORTANT: The determining factor as to whether there has been damage done, is how long it was driven after the tranny cooler ruptured. Coolant is a transmissions wort nightmare and will destroy it in no tim, hence the reason you must park right away.

What are the symptoms of when you tranny cooler ruptures?

~Loss of transmission fluid
~Tranny fluid will fill the radiator and your overflow will pop open and spray throughout your engine bay and even on the exterior of your vehile.
~Tranny will begin to slip, sue to tranny fluid loss
~The notorious straberry milk shake look on the tranny dip stick, within the raiator when cap is off and inside the over flow resevoir. All will display this look. It screams problems.

If you need additional info, let me know.

 

[bgmac]

Great, now you have me worried. I have strawberry looking coolant in my overflow. I thought the coolant in my radiator was green though, it is strawberry looking as well . How do I know for sure if I ruptured the tranny cooler? Also you didn't mention anything about having to fix the ruptured tranny cooler.

 

[sant6236]

Hi Again~

Im telling you that you ruptured the tranny cooler. The rest of your radiator is more thanlikely fine, but when the tranny cooler line busts it renders the radiator useless.

This was a design flaw by Toyota as far as I and many others are concerned. They incorporated the tranny coller to fit inside of the radiator and not externally like many. So, when the tranny cooler goes, the radiator goes, with the potentialto mess up many other things.

Although its somewhat of a rarity, it has been discussed all too often on this forum, considering it is specific.

Sorry to be blunt, but you should be worried. Your worry is what is whatts going to save your tranny and block.

IKf you have strawberry milk shake in your overflow and inside your radiator, then this is a for sure sign that the tranny cooler has ruptured inside o your radiator, hence th reason you are also seeing this color when you remove the radiator cap. Yes, your fluid was once green, but quickly mixed with ATF when the cooler ruptured, reating a strawberry milskake.

As for a remedy, again, you need to follow the steps I outlined in the prior post.

But, with regard to my personal situation, the baby is running like a charm because I followed those steps and didn't drive the Runner with this mix running through the Tranny and cooling parts for an extended amount of time.

I literally saw the symptoms and pulled it into a nearby shop, where they proceeeded to flush the transmission, (with water more than likey), and flushed the radiator, etc. This is all they are able to do unless you want them to rip the tranny apart and the engine to remove the excess fluid within your block and torque converter(very expensive and not worthwhile).

My suggestions is to flush the tranny once or twice depending on its color after the first time.

You then need to have the radiator flushed a minimum of 2-3 times and ideally you want to NOT be able to see ATF residue in the overflow anymore, this will be your guiding light as to whether you need to continue flushing the cooling system.

Again, the reason you have to keep flushing is because it is near impossible to remove all of your ATF and coolant by just a normal flush that shop does. Those fluid get into the engine and tranny so deep that you literally have to take them apart to remove it or you have to continue running it and flushing it, like I did.

Remember to buy and use the Dr. Tranny, it will re-establish this bond that you will more than likely lose after the tranny gets flushed, especially considering the mileage you have.

Also, you will most definitely have to buy a new radiator. ITs now junk.

The internal rubberpart of your overflow and radiator cap will swell in time and you will more than likely have to replace these.

Total was around $550, not by the dealer. This was a rebuilt radiator.

Hope this helps.

 

[bgmac]

How can I tell if I just have the "toyota Red" coolant, as compared to tranny/coolant mixing?

 

[sant6236]

Not sure.

All i know is that the strawberry milk shake is pretty darn apparent.

It almost looks like a slight brown milk.

 

[wildcar]

Well I havent driven the 4Runner in two weeks since I have noticed it, I have been to busy to work on it right now. I got a new radiator and I already have coolant and flush for the cooling system. I pulled the drain plug on the transmission and the fluid was red and didn't look like it was mixed with coolant, wasent runny like it was dilluted with coolant so I'm hopping that I caught it early. I have an appointment to get the transmission flused.

My question is can I hook the transmission lines up to the new radiator so I can run the motor to flush it out? I didn't drain the tranny, just let enough out to check the fluid or will the low oil level prevent me from doing this?

 

[sant6236]

This is beyond me.

Someone else needs to chime in.

 

[bgmac]

I had my local toyota dealer look at mine, and they said it was fine. It was just the Toyota red coolant and that is just a little bit old. On another note, they offered to do my timing belt and water pump for $495 which includes labor, parts and tax and they are giving me a loaner car for the day! Its going in on Tuesday.

 

[Tomsriv]

Nearly all cars have the trans cooler in the radiator, it is not a design flaw. Only heavy duty trucks use an external radiator style cooler. That said, it is pretty unusual to get the coolant and trans fluid mixed. The tanks are made of aluminum, brass plastic or copper. None of those corrode very easily and if the coolant is changed occasionally they should last a long time. It is usually the seals between the water tanks and the core that give out on a bad radiator. Their are no trans cooler seals inside the tank to give out.

 

[Charlee78]

Hi, guys, sorry to hear that Wildcar. With my experience in the past, if your tranny fluid was contaminated by coolant, no matter what you will do, the tranny will eventually fail.

This being said, if you want to be sure what coolant and DEX look like together, put the two of them in a bucket and mix them. You cannot go wrong after that little test.

Like I said earlyerr, don't spend hundreds on flushes for the transmission if it had coolant in it, after 2 weeks like you said, the damage is already done, clutches, o rings are already contaminated.

Hope this helps you. Don't want to get you worried, just want to tell you the truth with my experience.

 

[Charlee78]

The problem with those runners is the tranny cooler located in the radiator that cracks and let the fluids mix depending on the pressure on each side of the tanks. This is a common problem with those trucks and I would recommand to buy an aftermarket cooler to fix the problem for good (you would still have to change the rad ...)

 

[sant6236]

Charlee78~

Please elaborate on your past experience.

I also believe your contamination statement to an extent, but would like you to support it as much as possible with facts.

 

[Charlee78]

Well working as a maechanic for Toyota for the past 10 years helped me alot to see all kind of things...

Busted radiator in 4runners is one of them, I did try to flush a couple of transmissions but the trucks all came back a couple of weeks later on the towing due to a transmission failure.

I've seen clutches completely burned and mixed with the oil/coolant in the oil pan, o rings twice the size they should be, stuck valves in valve bodies...

Problem is you can't possibly flush all the coolant in the transmission, the only way to do it is to dismantle the transmission. Even if there is only 250ml of coolant in the oil (around 10/12 liters) it will go everywhere and will contaminate every part that is not made to handle coolant.

 

[sant6236]

Well thats interesting, thanks for sharing.

Its been roughly 8 months since my tranny cooler line ruptured and I have prbably put around 11,000 miles on it since and have had no problems except for the torque converter shudder, which I helped remedy with Dr. Tranny.

 

[Charlee78]

Glad to hear that you could save your transmission, nobody wants to get involved in changing/ repairing one. You are the first person I've heard that could save it. One thing that helped you is you did it quickly, earlyer in the thread, Wilcar stated:

"Well I havent driven the 4Runner in two weeks since I have noticed it..."

Tell what you want, after two weeks, IF coolant is present in the transmission, no flushes or fuid will be able to repair this.
This is my opinion.

If Wildcar wants to spend 500- 600$ to try to save his tranny, he can go and try, I sure wish him good luck and hope for him to save the hassle of replacing a transmission. Just don't want nobody to spend that money for nothing...

 

[Charlee78]

Hey, did you repair your truck????

 

[Kevs442]

Strawberry Milkshakes

Yes, the dreaded strawberry milkshake is indeed costly, no matter how you go at it. I had mine happen around 101,000 mi. The trans cooler line fitting cracked right at the radiator. Going down the highway and saw "smoke" coming out from under my hood. I immediately pulled over & shut it off. My buddy is a highly skilled technician, so I had it towed to his shop. It took SEVERAL flushings of BOTH the cooling system & the transmission (with a BG machine & doing pan/filter changes). The strawberry milkshake in BOTH systems is a MUTHA to get cleared out! This week my trans finally took a dump @ about 138,000. Luckily my buddy owns a shop so I got free labor & materials at his cost. I couldn't imagine what a dealership would charge for all the work we did. If I had to pay a dealer it probably wouldn't be cost effective to save the trans, maybe even the whole truck. So we saved it for a while, from my personal experience, I'd strongly recommend to anyone who gets the strawberry milkshake to plan on a trans rebuild!

 

[wildcar]

I forgot all about this thread, well any way the runner is still running strong 2 years later. Will be working on 300,000 miles before the end of the year. Apparently I got lucky and caught it in time.
I don't know where charlee78 gets his work done but it dosent cost anywhere near 500-600 dollars to fix this problem. I spent about $150 on a tranny flush at a well respected shop in our area, not an aamco or jiffy lube. The radiator cost me if I remember right about $135 for a new one.
I did all the work myself except the tranny flush, so im out a total of $300 bucks, that's if you catch it before it gets into the tranny and motor.

 

[mark.jeffers]

I think I got the same problem- See video

I think this what I have as well. Is this what your coolant looked like?

This is an 01 4runner

https://youtu.be/5qd7RlSGSXo

I forgot all about this thread, well any way the runner is still running strong 2 years later. Will be working on 300,000 miles before the end of the year. Apparently I got lucky and caught it in time.
I don't know where charlee78 gets his work done but it dosent cost anywhere near 500-600 dollars to fix this problem. I spent about $150 on a tranny flush at a well respected shop in our area, not an aamco or jiffy lube. The radiator cost me if I remember right about $135 for a new one.
I did all the work myself except the tranny flush, so im out a total of $300 bucks, that's if you catch it before it gets into the tranny and motor.