PM sent..old post...WOW..

There are many great Synthetic fliuds.., just get the proper weight and you will be fine..

Not the choice, but was mine.. good luck..

 

yeah whatever you do, don't just keep pumping the fluid in until it leaks out of thefill hole, like most people do with their diff and MT fluid changes...there's a specific capacity to follow and a certain way to check it described in the owner's manual (half inch below the fill hole or something). When the new edges went to the tremec tr3650 in 2001, I guess they were having a lot of problems, which some contributed to having too much fluid in the case (although there were tsbs for partial rebuilds on the trans and some fixed their issues by swapping to a different spec fluid)...if you have it done, make a copy of the owner's manual page that shows the proper fill level and give it to the service advisor/technician so they don't just pump it until it overflows the fill hole.
edit: I plan on changing mine either every 15K or 30K, and using the ford spec, just to cover my a$$ in case of problems (note: ford's non-synthetic dex-merc has been superceded to their part-synthetic mercon V, which will be the new spec when the old stuff is discontinued if it hasn't been already)...originally I was going to do royal purple or an equivalent in the MT and diff, then I figured it might give the dealer an excuse to bounce me for warranty on these items...

 

Thanks for the advice, I think I will have ford do it for me and bring in a copy of the manual as suggested.

So you think I should just go with the Ford stuff then instead of the Royal Purple? I am a little new to the car world so dont know it RPand the otheraftermarket fluids are more hype than performance.

 

lol Im not sure I'd show up at Ford with a Ford manual....

ANyways its easy to do. Drain and then fill with a pump. Use a bent object, like a twist tie, to check the fluid level. I did mine at 6K miles and at 9K miles, the second being after FOrd drained my Mobil1 to work on my tranny/clutch, and I didnt trust whatever they put back in.

Its so easy a therapist could do it.

 

^^^ yeah bringing the manual to the Ford dealer might be a quick route to a sh*tty service lol...
given the problems with these trannies in the new edges (although I haven't read too many problems with the s197 outside of out-and-out abuse), I just wanted to protect the 5/60 powertrain by sticking with their stuff and changing it more often...although some report a night-and-day difference with the RP syncromax...

 

Service guy at the Ford Dealership told me the oil for the Transmission is good for like 60k miles or something, and the differential is good for 90k. Anyway, he said if I wanted to add my own fluid then to just do it after my warranty is up or else if something goes wrong and they sent the oil out to be tested and it comes out that I used non-ford spec oil then yeah. I do run RP in the engine though.

 

yeah engine oil seems to be wide open as long as you're running a part or full synthetic 5w20...

...due to the beating I subject my car to on a daily basis, I'll be stepping up the maintenace schedule...like I said probably every 15K for the MT and diff regardless of what the dealer or manual says...maybe 30K, haven't decided...

 

Of course they say its good for 60K, they want your tranny to blow up so you buy another car. If they can get you to wait until 60K, then chances are the tranny will blow later on at a perfect time that won't take too long and will be a timewhen you'll say "That Ford made it a long ENOUGH time.... I think Ill go buy another".