5 Spd. Tranny, ATF or Gear Lube??

[Isotrip®]

Well my 5 Spd. tranny went out on my '92 X and I got a replacement from a used parts place (read: Auto Salvage) the replacement came out of a '91 Navajo. Anyways.. I got it home and I went to check the fluid level and it smells like there is Gear Lube in it instead of ATF. Now I was under the impression that ATF is required for all OD trannys and if you put Gear Lube in them than they become almost impossible to shift when they are cold. Can anyone here confirm whether I use ATF? TIA!

 

[Slick Rick]

There were two diferent kinds of 5 speed manuals offered in the earlier X's, like in yours. Shortly after, they stoped using one of the trannies, which is the Mitsubishi 5 speed. Most of the Xplorers have the Mazda 5 speed. The Mitsubishi takes gear oil, and the Mazda requires ATF. Like I said, the Mitsubishi's are rare, but there is a good possibility that you have that tranny, considering that you got it out of a 91. Do you know if yours is the Mitsu?I guess you might wanna look at the invoice when you had that job done, and see if it says so or not, or ask the mechanic. Also, the tranny code for the Mazda 5 speed is M5OD.

 

[Isotrip®]

Well I researched it a bit more and I have come to the conclusion that it is in fact a Mazda 5 Spd. After dropping the old tranny out this morning and comparing the two (Both had the F17A Code) they were both Identical. I drained the Gear Lube, Flushed it with Tranny Flush, and put in ATF. I installed the tranny and it seems to work good other than if I am slowing down and go to down shift into third sometimes it is like it didnt engage the gear all the way and kind of grinds. If I try again it works fine and all other times it seems to work perfectly. I wonder if this is due to not having enough fluid maybe?

BTW I did all the work myself so I have no invoice other than the one from the salvage yard and that was just "5 pd. '91 Navajo Transmission.

 

[Slick Rick]

To fill the tranny, you just keep putting fluid in until it starts coming out of the fill plug, that's what I did with mine. It takes just a bit under 3 quarts if I remember correctly. And by the way use a synthetic too. The Mazda tranny gets really hot and cooks that fluid. A conventional ATF will NOT last very long and starts degrading shortly. My fluid was like a murky purple-brown color....sick.