Oil in Manual transmission question

[IvanHoe]

I was checking the tranny oil in my 88 camry and the odd thing is that there's gear oil in it and NOT ATF, which is what Toyota and Chiltons says is suppossed to be in there. The V6 manual transmission uses gear oil and the 91 and up uses gear oil, but mine is suppossed to have ATF.
Does this seem odd to anyone else?
Also when I pulled the filler plug off, I expected only a trickle to ooze out....if that, but instead it flowed out a little too fast. I got nervous and quickly plugged it back up so as not to lose too much. I guess this might have occured cause I did it while the car was still warm from a recent drive, who knows .

Has anybody out there ever replaced there manual tranny oil?
And if so, has anybody tried the Redline stuff (MT-90 is suppossed to be good for Toyotas)
Seeing as my manual tranny has Gear oil in it for some odd reason, I dont wont to downgrade the viscosity to ATF at this point.
My mechanic has said that it never needs to be replaced, but Ive heard conflicting reports on this.

[Toysrme]

Yes, it should be replaced eventually. You're mis-reading the manuals. It clearly calls for SAE 75W-90, or 80w-90 gear oil, Atleast meeting API specifications GL-3, GL-4 & GL-5.

[IvanHoe]

Originally Posted by Toysrme

Yes, it should be replaced eventually. You're mis-reading the manuals. It clearly calls for SAE 75W-90, or 80w-90 gear oil, Atleast meeting API specifications GL-3, GL-4 & GL-5.

This is from the online Toyota manual for a 1990 Camry:

Chiltons However States that the differential uses gear oil but the manual Transmission uses ATF for models until 1991. The thing is that 5 speed differentials are incorporated into the transmission itself, whereas the automatic cars seperate the diff from the tranny.

[RAV4EVR]

Interesting.

I plan to change transmission oil for my 5 speed 00 V6 Camry myself but haven't learned yet.
Sequoia is the other one I want to learn to change..

Is Chilton good with this stuff??

[toyomoho]

Look at the on-line manuals first. They should provide more then enough info for servicing your car.

http://oregonstate.edu/~tongt/camry

[97camryman]

You probably can use ATF. I run Dexron III in my AE86 T50 tranny and it loves it. Those old crunchy gearboxes love ATF. My buddies grand am 5 speed calls for DEX III as well. Its a getrag tranny and that thing loves it some ATF. Go for it, ATF is thinner and helps smooth out shifting especially in the cold of winter.

[BakaWill]

alldata has a tsb saying you should use gear oil for smoother performance. i thing the Technical service Bullitin is from like 1991 lol

[IvanHoe]

Originally Posted by 97camryman

You probably can use ATF. I run Dexron III in my AE86 T50 tranny and it loves it. Those old crunchy gearboxes love ATF. My buddies grand am 5 speed calls for DEX III as well. Its a getrag tranny and that thing loves it some ATF. Go for it, ATF is thinner and helps smooth out shifting especially in the cold of winter.

That may be the case, but considering it's been running with Gear oil for atleast ten years, I would think that draining the gear oil and replacing it with thinner viscosity ATF would probably NOT be a good idea......it's used to the thick stuff

Originally Posted by BakaWill

alldata has a tsb saying you should use gear oil for smoother performance. i thing the Technical service Bullitin is from like 1991 lol

Well that explains why my 5 speed has gear oil rather then ATF like the service manual states you should use. The original owner mustve taken the car into the "stealership" for routine maintenance and they replaced the original ATF with gear oil as per the TSB.

Thanx for clearing that up BakaWill!

[RAV4EVR]

Originally Posted by toyomoho

Look at the on-line manuals first. They should provide more then enough info for servicing your car.

http://oregonstate.edu/~tongt/camry

Holy crap....

This is nice............... Thanks..........