how important and what kind of problems may apply without one? also what are the symptoms that could possibly occur when you need one?

 

It is very important if you want to keep driving your "D". the book say change oil and filter every 37k. Hard shifting is one of the symptoms.

 

03:

As DRO states the factory book calls for a drain and refill with new filter every 30k. This interval is lowered to 15k if you tow a lot.

Some folks are of the opinion that no service should be done until it breaks, which MAY never happen.

IMO, a filter /fluid change overy so often is good insurance against problems with $2500-3000 transmission.

Even if you do the service, it may still blow up. There are no guarantees.

One more thought. The tranny flushes are not known to add to tranny life. They should be avoided in the case of our Durango units.

You will know though that you did the best you could.

Don

 

+1 for n8ech.

My tranny went out at 79k. I don't tow, but did the 15k fluid changes just because I know these oem tranny's are not solid based on everyone's past input. So I eventually became another broken tranny victim when my Durango is still relatively new and low miles. Dealer wanted $2900 for replacement with 3/36 warranty, but I don't want to come back to them for another replacement after the 3/36 runs out. So decided to pay fastman to have my tranny custom built and bullet proofed and hopefully outlast my Durango! Still came out cheaper than having the dealer replace it with oem.

 

Well of course the custom tranys will beat the life out of a regular one....He He He...

Trans flushes are good and bad. Good because they blow new fluid through the trans and break up any crap. Bad because half the time the shops use the wrong fluid (cheap fluid) to do it with. This can raise hell on them. You are better to just do a filter and fluid change to make sure that the right fluid is used and don't forget to watch them cause they lie.

In addition, when taking your truck into a Jiffy Lube or something like this to get it done they use multi vehical use fluid which is not recommended for all Chrysler.

 

for dodge, you have to use either ATF+3 or +4 tranny fluids depending on your year model. But heard that any owners that started out with ATF+3 can go to +4. But +4 users cannot go backwards.