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Well I really painted myself into a corner! Even though our CVT tranny is sealed and, reportedly, doesn't need fluid change, I went ahead and bought 5 qts of CVT fluid from my Toyota dealer ($95 bucks, holy cow!) My 2013 iQ just went over 50,000 miles.
I saw a youtube video from a guy with an iQ and he showed how to drain and refill the CVT...easy, right? (It should've been a tip-off that he disabled any comments on the video.)
WRONG! Draining was pretty easy....you have to remove the cap then you use an allen wrench to unscrew a strange tube thing then the fluid drained (which wasn't awfully dirty but not the cleanest, either.) According to the video, you just refill the fluid on another opening on the top of the tranny, just below the battery. Getting that open was just one cap but using a funnel to refill it was NOT working...it just kept running over and only a little went in. So I replaced the cap, started up the car and went through the gears and it did take some fluid but not as much as had come out. So I did that a few more times.
I guess we're supposed to use that strange tube I removed to refill the fluid from underneath...using some kind of a pump or something. (Or find a way, from above, to refill it...maybe that tube is in the way and I have to move it a bit to the side to get fluid to go in?
Has anybody done a fluid change on their iQ? I'm not driving it until I get the fluid back in...worst case scenario is I have it towed on a flat-bed truck to the dealer to get her refilled. (I won't be doing this job, again....ARGH!)
***JUNE 6 2017 UPDATE*** Okay, folks do NOT try changing the CVT fluid yourself. I just got my iQ back from the mechanic down the street and they got it all fixed. Apparently, these CVT trannies are like Mercedes which means you have to everything from the drain plug on the bottom. (Which requires a tool that cost about $400) While I'm glad I got it fixed, I wish I would've waited until she hit 100,000 miles before having this done....but maybe this will save others a major pain in the butt!! Oh the job was $230 but because I'm a loyal customer they did it for $180.
I saw a youtube video from a guy with an iQ and he showed how to drain and refill the CVT...easy, right? (It should've been a tip-off that he disabled any comments on the video.)
WRONG! Draining was pretty easy....you have to remove the cap then you use an allen wrench to unscrew a strange tube thing then the fluid drained (which wasn't awfully dirty but not the cleanest, either.) According to the video, you just refill the fluid on another opening on the top of the tranny, just below the battery. Getting that open was just one cap but using a funnel to refill it was NOT working...it just kept running over and only a little went in. So I replaced the cap, started up the car and went through the gears and it did take some fluid but not as much as had come out. So I did that a few more times.
I guess we're supposed to use that strange tube I removed to refill the fluid from underneath...using some kind of a pump or something. (Or find a way, from above, to refill it...maybe that tube is in the way and I have to move it a bit to the side to get fluid to go in?
Has anybody done a fluid change on their iQ? I'm not driving it until I get the fluid back in...worst case scenario is I have it towed on a flat-bed truck to the dealer to get her refilled. (I won't be doing this job, again....ARGH!)
***JUNE 6 2017 UPDATE*** Okay, folks do NOT try changing the CVT fluid yourself. I just got my iQ back from the mechanic down the street and they got it all fixed. Apparently, these CVT trannies are like Mercedes which means you have to everything from the drain plug on the bottom. (Which requires a tool that cost about $400) While I'm glad I got it fixed, I wish I would've waited until she hit 100,000 miles before having this done....but maybe this will save others a major pain in the butt!! Oh the job was $230 but because I'm a loyal customer they did it for $180.