Dang, probably why nobody has done it yet. The coolant entering the tranny can be up to 107C which can't be good for longevity.

 

Im just not sure doing that would help much. It may help if it would circulate through the cooler properly. There theory behind running coolant to the inner cooler was so the transmission would shift consistent in warm and cold climates.. The best thing we can do is changing the fluid to a fully synthetic. Im a firm believer in that. And the key is changing it before you develop transmission problems.. I so wish they had the standard oil cooler!

 

personally I would use Amsoil. They have awesome ATF that holds up very well. I even use there products in our drag car.

 

another user posted an email reply from Amsoil saying they do not have a fluid compatable with the lastest mini aisin transmission

 

You can go on the North American Penrite website and use their recommendation guide.

 

Well it may be true..But what do you mean about the latest? My 2013 R56 shows up with being able to use there signature series or there OE type ATF.. When I called amsoil the only thing they didn't agree with was the fact that MINI/BMW was calling for lifetime fluid. He said they don't consider there fluid or anyother fluid to be lifetime where no service was needed.

 

the correct atf for the aisin is jws3309, made by mobil and also sold by toyota as atf type T-IV

amsoil did not have an equivalent for this

bobtheoilguy says there are no equivalent either

an atf type III or mercon (sp) atf or equivalent will cause damage per bobtheoilguy

 

I have a friend that owns a transmission shop ... he is going to contact aisin ... I will post his reply to me

a while ago I asked him if there was a synthetic equivalent to jws3309 and he said no

slogging through mobil web site, they say jws3309 is "an ultra refined, ultra pure" dino based atf with a specific additive pack for aisin auto transmissions

 

my friend says he has customers with well over 200,000 miles on aisin transmissions, but he has changed the oil every 2 years/30,000 miles, whichever comes first, since new

he drains them overnight (as close to 24 hours as possible), capturing the drained oil ... he says he gets 5-5.5 quarts out by draining overnight vs 2.5-3 quarts just dumping the oil

he does not do multiple oil dumps

total capacity is listed as 6.5 quarts for a dry rebuilt or new transmission

 

Been using royal purple Max ATF in the 2012 S and 2005 scion tC for about 5k miles now. 2 quarts changed in the mini and 4 in the toyota, both Aisin trannys. So far so good.

 

Amsoil does meet the specs for the jws 3309. Im not sure I understand the info confusion. If one doesn't feel comfortable of running anything other than factory OE atf then I can understand that. I personally am very confident in Amsoil just from my experience with there products.

 

For all of you who think that Toyotas T-IV ATF is made from the blood of unicorns there's your proof it don't mean fu¢king sh¡t. I'll stick to using Penrith and dropping 2 litres every 10k km and update if I end up having issues the same goes for anyone using another manufactures ATF. It might take a while but we should end up with some dependable data on what is the best ATF to use.

 

I got my 06 a few years ago with 45k on it and within the first month of ownership I did the 3x drain and fill with Royal Purple. I have since only put about 17k on it and when it reaches 20 k I plan on doing the pan and filter and refill. It's been good but I'm not taking any chances. I believe I will refill with RP, not totally sure yet. Hard to say if over the long term the RP is a mistake or not. I don't know if we have enough data from those who have changed from the original fluid to synthetics yet to know. You would think full synthetic would be better, I am hoping so. So far so good.

 

Grrrrr.

Replaced my valve body today. Flushed and filled with Royal Purple ATF. No issues.
Test drive: started out easy first 10-15 minutes, verified D and SD were both behaving as they should. Tested manual shift in all gears - all good. Then flogged it for about 15 minutes, and it performed perfectly.... until everything got good and hot.

Then it didn't. First symptom was extended flare on the 3-4 shift. Then hesitated between pretty much all gears. Then would hang for extended time on any shift, then slam into gear. Eventually displayed EP and I limped it home, with lots of tests of restarts. Didn't get any better.

At home, re-checked fluid level (again). Drained about 1/2 qt out. Tested again. Still has same symptoms even though it's been cooling for 1+ hours.

Grrrr. Either I got a bad valve body... or I have something bigger going on.

 

So is the 3-4 flare a sure sign of a bigger problem (e.g. bushing/seal)?

I'm a little perplexed why it only does it when hot....

 

Like you I was hoping for better news.

No idea why it only happens when its hot maybe get the adaptations cleared?

 

"We have never had to have a customer update or change TCM or ECM with a replacment valve body. The transmission adapts must be reset and the transmission must be drive learned and that is all that is needed when swapping in a replacement valve body."

This is from Revmax on a Porsche site

I'm assuming its the same for MINI as both use Aisin autos. You should contact Revmax to confirm.

 

Couldn't see how to reset tranny adaptations with INPA, I'm working on getting my copy of GT1 running now so I can try with that.

INPA COULD see transmission-specific errors and status (including temp!), test solenoids, etc. so that's cool. I may play around with that some on the street.

Once I can get adaptations cleared I'll go for a long drive to "ease" back into it and see what happens.

Sidebar: While I had things apart, I took a good look at the oil pan, clearances, etc. thinking about the concept of an external oil cooler. There's actually plenty of clearance to weld a couple of nipples onto the deep part of the pan on opposite sides / corners. Then would just need a suitable pump, radiator, and hoses. And add additional fluid to cover capacity of that secondary system. I'm thinking that maybe I'd set this up with a manual switch to "arm" the system. For practical purposes, could just run it all the time while on track, or while hammering it otherwise. But ideal would be to put a secondary temperature sensor in also, and (when switched on) run it based on an oil temp threshold.

Cool thing is, with the ability to monitor the temp with INPA, once I get this thing fixed, I can go out the hammer it and see what the real reported fluid temp is from the tranny. Or check it as soon as I roll off the track... then we can see what we're dealing with.

 

Remember if you do clear adaptations that you have to drive at curtain speeds for a given distances for readaptation. What they are you'll have to research or maybe Revmax would know.

 

The other common failure mode for this thing is a sleeve that starts to rotate. Classic symptom is the 3/4 flare or jump to neutral. It is repairable, but is a bigger deal.

Excerpt from Gears Magazine,
Ashift to neutral on the 3-4 shift can be caused if the steel sleeve down in thecase rotates. This cuts off the feed to the K2 clutch, which is needed to apply4th, 5thand 6th

Gears(we’ll cover this in more detail later).Another cause for a shift to neutral onthe 3-4 can be solenoid related. This typically happens after the valve body isreplaced or the unit rebuilt. The reason? The M1 solenoid (light gray wire) andthe B2/4-6 solenoid (black wire) have been crossed (figure 2). Always mark thesolenoids harness or take a picture to make sure you connect the harnesses tothe correct solenoids.

As discussed earlier, the sleeve for the K2 teflon sealing rings can spin in thecase (figure 7). This can cause the transmission to shift into neutral on the3-4 shift. You can check for this problem before removing the transmission byinstalling a pressure gauge on the K2 pressure tap (figure 8). Then drive the vehicle, and check the pressure during the 3-4shift. When the transmission shifts from 3rd to 4th, the pressure in the K2 clutch circuit should rise to 65-90 PSI.

•If the pressure doesn’t rise, look for a valve body problem such as a sticking valve or faulty solenoid.

•If thepressure rises normally but the transmission shifts into neutral, the sleeve isprobably rotated in the case. If you find a rotated sleeve,there are two fixes here. Replace the case from the dealer or repair the sleeve with a kit from Sonnax. This product is brand new to the market. The rest of the hard parts in this unit have been holding up fairly well… so

 

Sooooo.... Revmax sent me a replacement torque converter clutch solenoid. Replaced it, and that resolved that problem... but I'm still having flare/neutral in the 3-4 shift, and some other things. I had quite a bit of new sludge in the pan and on the magnets, just from the last short test drive.

I think my clutches are shot, AND I think I have the sleeve/seal spinning in the case.

So I'm going to be doing a rebuild soon. Thinking about DIY'ing it. I have the manual, and not many things mechanical scare me... I'll buy tools if I need to...

 

Looking forward to the diy if you go ahead with it sorry that the valve body and solenoid didn't fix your problem.

Good luck and keep us updated on your progress.

 

I don't know if this has been posted before... but here's the service manual. You can buy a hardcopy of this for about $30 from various sources, or you can get a subscription to Scribd and download it (about $9 for one day, IIRC).

But you can view it online for FREE.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/219057584/TF60-SN-09G-09M-pdf

Here's a good exploded view:
http://www.makcotransmissionparts.co...f/AWTF60SN.pdf

Here's the Sonnax replacement K-2 clutch sleeve for the one that spins - available from multiple sources:
http://www.sonnax.com/parts/1800

Here's a supplier for the parts (there are others):
http://www.makcotransmissionparts.com/VW09m.html

This is the adventure that awaits.

 

Just for info, think here is another failure.....

Lady asked me to check her 2007 Cooper S auto out for sticking in 3rd gear and very bad change quality.
Drove the car and sure enough after 20 mins in traffic, if it had been mine, i would be toasting marsh mellows from the fire i had just lit!!! terrible, car had no idea what gear to try, hit neutral between gears, slammed in and out of gears, just terrible to drive.
121kms on the clock.

Thanks for all the info supplied on this site BTW, as after a good couple hours read up, i was prepared.
Drained the transmission fluid from the pan and differential housing drain plugs, black and very smelly. Got 2.5 litres out, put same back in. Drove 40kms and tried to get hot as possible, drained out again, got 2.5 litres. Refilled and drove, this time handing car back to owner.
I recon its improved at least 60% from the initial road test, light throttle car behaves fine, not once did it miss a change. However, it was still slamming into and out of gears on roundabouts and the quality of the change was not as it should be, much better but not what a 30k car should change gear like.
Suggested to owner we could change oil again to help the dilution of old oil, but ultimately the damage i think may already be done.

Time for a new car maybe..........

 

I rebuilt mine, am waiting on a low-mileage torque converter to get it back in the car and test. My K-2 clutch sleeve had not spun, but the K-2 clutch was burned out, worn completely through the friction material and into the steel on several of the friction plates. I don't know whether this was the result of valve body failure, or just driving the crap outta it with lots of hard 3-4 shifts over 150k miles.

The rebuilt went pretty easily, I did a full writeup on the other site.