Flushing Your Transmission?

[Frankie's Market]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

In every industry there's a phananama known as "old wives tails". It's myths that have been perpetuated for ages. It may have been an accepted practice at one time, but things have changed. (Like the chemical that go into mothballs).

I guess you better the guys at Mythbusters that they've been fooled by an OWT. Because they found the claim that naphthalene mothballs increase power to be plausible.

[TATTRAT]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

It would be an especially bad idea to do it to an older transmission where the varnish may be what's holding things together. I think there's been enough cases of transmission failing shortly after a flush that many mechanics do not recommend it.

That is the camp I am in. Never had a new car, always older cars, and this is what I was told, so I never bothered, nor had issues.

[68-eldo]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

If you're going to disparage a respected mechanic like Nitta, you must have some pretty impressive professional credentials to put on the table.

That’s a much nicer response than I expected.

To answer the question as to why Nitta was a UH instructor I’ll say this: The skill set needed to put together a lesson plan, get up in front of a class and put your point across to a wide variety of students, then administer test and grade students is a very different skill set than that of an auto mechanic. I think any teacher here will confirm that teaching is a profession all its own. It would be an insult to the teaching profession to say any old mechanic can be a teacher. Even the best mechanic might not have the needed teaching skills.

The three requirements I would think are needed to be an instructor is
1) Put in an application. I doubt the top 10 mechanics in the state have even considered applying for a teaching position.
2) Have respectable teaching credentials. If you don’t have any training in teaching will the UH hire you as an instructor? I doubt it.
3) Have above average subject matter knowledge. I think the higher you rate in this category the better off you are in competition for the position, but if you are the only one with 1) and 2) above then 3) just needs to meet minimum requirements.

Why did KITV use Nitta? Maybe because he is/was an instructor at UH?

Me; I’m strictly amateur. I would never make it in a professional shop. I do component repair. For example if the brake calipers need work I will remove them, clean and disassemble them. Put new seals on the piston, run a hone through the cylinders, reassemble it and reinstall it. A professional shop can not afford to do all that bench work. Labor is not a profitable charge. The remove and install can not be avoided. But the bench work can be eliminated by simply replacing the calipers with new ones. The mark up on parts is where the shops make their money. They buy the parts at wholesale then sell the parts at retail+. That’s hard for me to do, throw away a part that only needs a little work to make it like new.

As for Nitta, when I went to his web site the first thing that caught my eye was the ad front and center for oil. Sorry but when advertising comes before the information I was looking for he gets a couple of demerits.

But when I scrolled to the bottom of the page and saw that about using mothballs….. This is old stuff from the ‘30s IIRC. I had to Google it to refresh my memory. The web pages I linked to in my post above said using mothballs in your tank can cause carbon build up and pinging. If you’ve been using mothballs and you have pinging now you know why.

Modern computer controlled engines have oxygen sensors and catalytic converters that can be damaged or plugged by burning chemicals that are not intended to be put in the gas tank. Also not addressed is the possibility not all the components of mothballs will dissolve in modern gasoline. What does not dissolve will remain in the tank to possibly plug up the sock filter in the tank.

So why would George advise people to do this? Well if I was a conspiracy theorist I would say because he makes a living repairing cars and changing oxygen sensors and catalytic converters is profitable. But I will give him the benefit of the doubt and say that maybe someone told him about this and he did not check it out thoroughly before posting it.

Like Gecko Geek says check it out for yourself. If you are computer literate enough to read this forum then you can Google around and see all the other opinions. Just look at the facts that back up the statements. If its all opinion and no facts beware.

[68-eldo]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

I guess you better the guys at Mythbusters that they've been fooled by an OWT. Because they found the claim that naphthalene mothballs increase power to be plausible.

The problem with Myth Busters is they set up a single situation and base the results on the outcome of that one test. Did they run the test car with mothballs in the tank for 30,000 miles or more? How would they know if there was long term effects on the engine?

[craigwatanabe]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

Heard that mentioned by George Nitta on his Automotive 101 radio show. I don't know the why's and how's of it. I guess if you are really curious, best thing would be to ask him directly.

And speaking of George Nitta (one of the most respected and knowledgeable mechanics in the state), he also is a firm believer in using 92 octane gas in ALL cars, no matter what the automakers recommend. And if you want to know his reasons, just tune in to his radio program. It is a topic that comes up almost every week. Go to:

http://www.georgenitta.com/

Okay FM I have to disagree with you on George. I produced his show for years on KHVH and on KGU. One thing I do know about him is that his advice can be either right on or completely off base.

Case in point, a lady calls wondering why her car pings while going up the Pali. George responds, "What kind of battery do you have, if it's not an Interstate battery that's the reason why its pinging".

We go to a commercial, I ask, "George did you hear the question correctly? Why would an Interstate battery vs a Sears Diehard battery make any difference regarding pinging?"

He says Interstate batteries are better batteries and won't cause pinging.

He says to use mothballs that use napthalene to increase your octane rating because it's how refineries raise their octane in their base gas. Never mind it's Naptha and not Napthalene that raises octane.

He says to use WD-40 in your gas tank to increase horsepower in your engine. Never mind that the use of a penetrating oil will mess up your sensors from pre-combustion to oxygen sensors.

I've worked with George professionallly for years in the radio biz and I like the guy but some of his responses leave me and a whole lot of callers our screener wouldn't patch thru to the board wondering if he heard all the questions correctly as well.

I wouldn't call him crazy, just a perfectionist who's answers border on extreme what if's.

Case in point, your right front tire blows out because of a state worker forgetting to pick up some debris on the road. You file a claim against the state and the state reimburses you for one damaged tire.

George tells his listening audience that because of tracking all four tires need to be replaced or else the difference in tracking from the new tire could cause you to lose control of the vehicle. He's accurate but man a bit too extreme. He'd probably win in court but quite honestly I can't see changing all four tires because one went bad. I can see changing the two front's as a pair but not all four.

You want to see how much of a perfectionist he is? Try going down to his shop (where ever it has moved to) and look at his cement floors. They're totally clean! not a drop of oil on them...just like his white coat he wears. He's totally clean.

I used to use mothballs in my 86 Buick Century station wagon until one went inside my mechanical fuel pump and punctured the diaphragm. I told him that and from that day on he recommended you dillute the mothballs in a concentration of either WD-40 or gasoline before adding it to your gas tank.

And yes the fuel pump was located before the fuel filter.

And let me make one correction, it's not hydroscopic, it's Hydrascopic and just because it ain't in Wikipedia that doesn't mean it doesnt exist as a word.

Hydraulic oil is hydrascopic in nature. Brake fluid is a form of hydraulic oil, powersteering fluid and auto tranny fluid are both hydraulic fluid and both are also considered hydrascopic.

Now I can also see the reasoning behind not flushing older cars and blowing seals. If your tranny fluid is that old it's probably got a lot of water buildup (BECAUSE IT'S HYDRASCOPIC). When you use a hydraulic system, you cannot allow any level of expansion or compression of the fluid that could change it's ability to move a piston at differing stroke distances.

That's why air in brake lines make brake pressure feel spongy. You have to bleed out the air to ensure a good pedal to caliper response.

In auto trannys, air can do the same with the shift valves. So what about water? Water as a liquid can compress. It's called super compressability and it's a term used in hydro-dynamics. When water super compresses (under extreme pressure), It releases the oxygen molecule. That's why a propellor on a boat when viewed underwater has a trail of bubbles as it spins. This term is called cavitation.

Too much cavitation causes the prop to not move as much water volume to propel the boat forward because it's trying to move air created from the leading edges of the prop as it super compresses the water like a ram.

In a transmission too much water under pressure can cause cavitation amounting to the shift valves compressing air as opposed to tranny fluid. This results in the shift valve not shifting the gears.

So you flush out the old fluid that is water saturated and put in new fluid that will perform with no cavitation on the shift valves.

Your seals are old but because of lower fluid pressure due to cavitation, this time from the tranny pump's impellors, the seals don't blow, but put in new fluid and suddenly those worn seals can't take the applied pressure put on them and they blow.

To sum it up, doing a tranny flush on a high mileage vehicle can be disasterous if the seals are old and the tranny fluid has always been topped off. But if you've drained your tranny fluid occasionally over the life of your car then I wouldn't assume the seals have been that badly decomposed because there wouldn't have been that much water to deteriorate those seals in the first place. In that case a tranny flush would be okay.

On octane, every car responsd differently to octane ratings. High compression vehicles require a longer explosion so high octane is necessary. Low-compression engines respond better to low octane which has a quicker combustion rate.

Once again if you do a compression test or if you do a leak down test on your valves and rings and show you have lower compression you're better off using lower octane gas.

All the crap and carbon build up on your heads has more to do with the quality of the fuel than the octane levels. But exhaust valves that have a lot of carbon build up retain a lot of the explosive heat and can ignite incoming air/fuel on the downstroke. This pre-detonation causes the explosive gasses to exit thru the intake valves as the downstroke closes the exhaust valves.

This backfiring of gasses can damage critical intake components such as your AFM or MAF with a richer air/fuel combustion Pinging can also be the cause of carbon build up on your valves. Carbon build up on the exhaust valve can result in a poor leak down test.

However the more critical issue on carbon build up on exhaust valves is with loss of power. If the exhaust valve doesn't seal during the maximum compression cycle the ignition and consequent explosion that is needed to drive the piston down can instead exhaust out of the exhaust valve robbing your engine of power. That piston doesn't drive as far down the cylinder as it should and results in loss of horsepower and fuel mileage.

[Frankie's Market]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

The problem with Myth Busters is they set up a single situation and base the results on the outcome of that one test. Did they run the test car with mothballs in the tank for 30,000 miles or more? How would they know if there was long term effects on the engine?

And compared to the research and test data that the Myth Busters crews accumulated, what experiments and data do you have to share with me?

If it's just information from other people's websites, well, stand in line.

[68-eldo]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

The word Hydrascopic is not in the Merriam Webster Online Dictionary either so you will need to define that word.

The word you've entered isn't in the dictionary. Click on a spelling suggestion below or try again using the search bar above.

Suggestions for Hydrascopic:
1. hydropathic 2. hydrospheric
3. hydrazoic acid 4. hydrospaces
5. hydrospace 6. hydrosolic
7. hydropathies 8. hydrochloric
9. hydrocarbon 10. hydrocephalies
11. hydrologic 12. hydroceles
13. hydraulically 14. hydrotherapy
15. hydriodic acid 16. hydrochloride
17. hierarchized 18. hydrochlorides
19. hydrocephaly 20. hydrotherapies

Cavatation is defined below, also from Merriam Webster Online Dictionary.

cavitation

Main Entry:
cav•i•ta•tion
Pronunciation:
\ˌka-və-ˈtā-shən\
Function:
noun
Etymology:
cavity + -ation
Date:
1895
: the process of cavitating: as a: the formation of partial vacuums in a liquid by a swiftly moving solid body (as a propeller) or by high-intensity sound waves; also : the pitting and wearing away of solid surfaces (as of metal or concrete) as a result of the collapse of these vacuums in surrounding liquid b: the formation of cavities in an organ or tissue especially in disease

[Frankie's Market]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

He says to use WD-40 in your gas tank to increase horsepower in your engine. Never mind that the use of a penetrating oil will mess up your sensors from pre-combustion to oxygen sensors.

Well, you certainly offered some interesting observations throughout your entire post, Craig. It's definitely some food for thought. And I say this in the very start of my reply to you, just to make it clear that I respect (but not necessarily agree) with what you have to say.

Now, with all those niceties out of the way,...

With regard to what you quoted above,.... I've never, ever, heard George say that WD-40 increases horsepower. Never. And I've tuned into his program about 75-80% of the time for the last dozen years or so. Now,.... the rationale that George gives for using liquid (not spray) WD-40 is not to boost HP. He says that it will displace the water in the fuel system, which in turn wards off corrosion and the other negative effects of moisture.

Now Craig, I've not listened to every Automotive 101 show. But almost all of the programs from the last 7 years are archived on his website. Would you be able to pinpoint the show where you've heard Nitta claim that WD-40 boosts engine HP? Because if you can't, then in my mind, it is one sign of you passing along information re: George Nitta that is incorrect/misremembered.

And please Craig, if you're gonna respond to this, keep it on this point. I don't want to get sidetracked in a debate about the other pros/cons of putting liquid WD-40 in the engine. I just want some kind of confirmation that would prove George Nitta claimed over the air that liquid WD-40, in and of itself, would boost HP. Because while George has made the claim that most (not all) cars would get increased power from mothballs, I've never heard him say that WD-40 has the same effect.

And just as a final note: I don't put WD-40 in my gas tank. To ward off moisture in my fuel system, I just go to the gas station often and top off my tank, usually 3 times a week.

[GeckoGeek]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

I guess you better the guys at Mythbusters that they've been fooled by an OWT. Because they found the claim that naphthalene mothballs increase power to be plausible.

That's damming with faint praise. Only "Plausible"? And "Increase power"? That far from saying it's a good idea. Long term wear and tear as well as fuel efficiency are more important to the average owner.

Mythbusters is fun to watch, but they're more about entertainment then science.

[Karen]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

Man, is flushing it a good idea or not.....is not my biggest concern on this thread.

Is it true that even when our new car's book says 87 Octane is fine for our car, that we really are wise to use only a minimum of 89? is that JUST for the break-in period?

Oh yeah, since this is a car thread...just why does Chevrolet have a 500 mile break-in for new autos, and yet Toyota has a 1,000? I mean obviously their engineers are WHY they say that, but why is there legitimacy to the big difference? or is there not?

[Frankie's Market]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

That's damming with faint praise. Only "Plausible"? And "Increase power"?

Well, as I told Mr. Eldorado earlier, whatever shortcomings and critiques that you want to lay on Myth Busters, at least they actually went out, experimented, and compiled data. Which is a lot more than what either of you bring the table, frankly speaking.

Myth Busters called the idea of mothballs increasing HP as plausible. They didn't debunk it.

That far from saying it's a good idea. Long term wear and tear as well as fuel efficiency are more important to the average owner.

Good questions that are definitely worth exploring. But at least now, we've moved this concept beyond being a mere "old wives tale."

True, Myth Busters didn't answer the question about long-term effects of wear and tear on the engine. NOW,.... what research and hard data can you point out that would give backbone to the idea that mothballs will shorten the life of an engine or hurt its fuel economy?

[craigwatanabe]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

Well, you certainly offered some interesting observations throughout your entire post, Craig. It's definitely some food for thought. And I say this in the very start of my reply to you, just to make it clear that I respect (but not necessarily agree) with what you have to say.

Now, with all those niceties out of the way,...

With regard to what you quoted above,.... I've never, ever, heard George say that WD-40 increases horsepower. Never. And I've tuned into his program about 75-80% of the time for the last dozen years or so. Now,.... the rationale that George gives for using liquid (not spray) WD-40 is not to boost HP. He says that it will displace the water in the fuel system, which in turn wards off corrosion and the other negative effects of moisture.

Now Craig, I've not listened to every Automotive 101 show. But almost all of the programs from the last 7 years are archived on his website. Would you be able to pinpoint the show where you've heard Nitta claim that WD-40 boosts engine HP? Because if you can't, then in my mind, it is one sign of you passing along information re: George Nitta that is incorrect/misremembered.

And please Craig, if you're gonna respond to this, keep it on this point. I don't want to get sidetracked in a debate about the other pros/cons of putting liquid WD-40 in the engine. I just want some kind of confirmation that would prove George Nitta claimed over the air that liquid WD-40, in and of itself, would boost HP. Because while George has made the claim that most (not all) cars would get increased power from mothballs, I've never heard him say that WD-40 has the same effect.

And just as a final note: I don't put WD-40 in my gas tank. To ward off moisture in my fuel system, I just go to the gas station often and top off my tank, usually 3 times a week.

When it comes to George Nitta, Mothballs and WD-40 go hand in hand with him. George can archive anything he wants and leave out whatever he won't but as his show producer on two radio stations I can vouch that he did make that claim.

[GeckoGeek]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

Well, as I told Mr. Eldorado earlier, whatever shortcomings and critiques that you want to lay on Myth Busters, at least they actually went out, experimented, and compiled data. Which is a lot more than what either of you bring the table, frankly speaking.

Myth Busters called the idea of mothballs increasing HP as plausible. They didn't debunk it.

But they didn't prove it either.

Why don't you do a search on the web and see how many other experts suggest or debunk the mothballs?

NOW,.... what research and hard data can you point out that would give backbone to the idea that mothballs will shorten the life of an engine or hurt its fuel economy?

Wrong bias. Before spending money and expending effort, you need to know that it will accomplish some desired objective without harm.

Otherwise I'll argue that you need to do 20 jumping jacks before staring your car. Can't prove that it won't harm anything? Well, then you better do it.

[68-eldo]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

FM to use your own words:

First off, get it straight.

I never said that moth balls do not boost octane ratings when put in the gas tank. I did point to two web pages that I agree with that say using mothballs in your gas tank can cause carbon build up that will cause pinging.

Are you saying that I can not make that claim unless I personally do experiments to prove my point? Then I hold you to the same standard. What hard evidence do you have that says using mothballs in your gas will not harm the engine and has benefits beyond buying the next higher octane rating of gas?

[68-eldo]

Re: Is flushing your transmission a good thing?

Man, is flushing it a good idea or not.....is not my biggest concern on this thread.

Is it true that even when our new car's book says 87 Octane is fine for our car, that we really are wise to use only a minimum of 89? is that JUST for the break-in period?

Oh yeah, since this is a car thread...just why does Chevrolet have a 500 mile break-in for new autos, and yet Toyota has a 1,000? I mean obviously their engineers are WHY they say that, but why is there legitimacy to the big difference? or is there not?

Karen, you might want to start a new thread about this. I think it is getting lost in the dust up here.