Alternate Gear Oil Filler Hole

[way]

A post I made a while back at another forum:

I changed the gear oil in my 96 3 cylinder 5 speed using Crvett69's suggestion. I used the speedometer cable gear hole. Here is what I did:

DO NOT DRAIN THE GEAR OIL AT THIS TIME. Make sure you can get the Speedometer gear out and/or the filler plug first. Won't do you much good if you drain the oil and not be able to put any back in.

Now, for the speedo gear:

1. Locate the speedo gear. Go to the brake fluid reservoir and look straight down. It looks like this::



Make sure the area is clean, use a vacuum if necessary. I undid the wire holding the cable with the green connector to make it easier to access the 10 mm bolt.

2. Slide the black cover up the speedo cable and this is what the assembly looks like:




The black puddle to the right is where I missed the funnel LOL I would probably use a longer one next time so I don't have to maneuver the bottle through the hoses/wires to get to the funnel. I used a 12 inch funnel so maybe a 16 inch one would be better. The arrows are pointing to a clip but you can probably leave it in since the whole assembly will slide out. You might have to wiggle the assembly back and forth while pulling on it, but it does come out by hand:



I apologize for the blurriness but the box shows the whole assembly. The gear is that little blurry thing at the left-center of the box. LOL That yellow thing to the left of the box is the funnel.

Removing the speedo gear assembly leaves about a nice big, 1 inch filler hole, just to the left of the center of the photo, by the orange glow of the flashlight :



Here's another shot looking straight down. The brake fluid reservoir is in the lower right of the picture:



Now DRAIN the oil out of the transmission. Now you can refill it. The funnel I used is about 12 inches long and it worked ok although I would recommend using a little longer funnel, maybe 16 inches or so.

The nice thing about using this method is that you can just unscrew the cap on the gear oil container and just pour it in without having to squeeze the oil through that ridiculously small nipple. The oil comes out nice and quick this way:



Once I got the speedo gear assembly removed, I drained the trans.

Hope this helps someone. The picture of the hole was taken after I filled the trans. The oil went into the trans as you can tell by how clean it is around the filler hole. That shiny dot in the middle of the hole is the flash reflecting off the fluid in the trans.

Thank you Crvett69. This makes changing the trans fluid almost as easy as changing the oil.

[DOCTORBILL]

Neat !

I was going to use the Clutch Cable Clamp bolt hole (toward the back of the Transmission),
but this way looks easier.

One thing to note - if you do this in the Winter, the 90 weight oil flows like thick, cold
molasses and it takes forever to get it into the transmission.

I used a clear tygon tube thru the traditional port on the back side.

Took hours before it all flowed into the transmission.

DoctorBill

[way]

Very Very good point Doc. I did this I think it was late November which was pretty cold at the time. I kept the oil inside on the heat register until I was ready to pour and it poured right out. Thanks for pointing that out.

[tmaxmetro]

Perhaps an even easier method is to use the traditional hole, a 6" pipe nipple, a 90 degree elbow, and another 6" or so pipe nipple. I just thead them on hand tight, in the order above, then use a standard funnel. This way, you don't need hoses, long funnels, or to even mess with the speedo cable - and everything holds itself in place.

[DOCTORBILL]

Yes.

I did that with my Riding Mower.

The 16 hp Tecumseh engine on my mower just has a screw in plug on the side
of the engine.

When you change oil, it dribbles all over the mower !

Really bright engineering on the part of "Murrey" mowers !

So I screwed in a 6" pipe and put a nipple over it.

Now, at least, I can drain it into a can....

It is nice to use a paper towel tube to direct the flow where I want it to go, also.

DoctorBill

[Jayd3]

If you don't know how much to put in measure how much you drained out: a cheap set of measuring cups for the garage is a great investment, still a good ideal to actually pull the check plug and make sure you have enough unless your sure of the amount.

Jay

[Woodie83]

Proper amount is 2.6 quarts, 2.5 is fine as a bit is going to stick to the internal parts. Best bet is to take out the fill plug no matter where you intend to refill from. It's much much easier to refill from the top, but the only way to be certain of the amount is to fill until it dribbles out the side ON A LEVEL SURFACE.