Hey so I’ve got a 2012 Nissan Maxima that I bought from a friend back in March. I bought it with 105k miles on it and it turns out he never changed the cvt fluid. I looked online and it says to use only the genuine Nissan fluid which is EXPENSIVE. I looked at other people with the same question and they got answers that said they can use another fluid as long as it’s the right kind. So for example, my car takes NS2 fluid, and I found this cheaper Castrol fluid and it says it works on most CVT transmissions. On the back of the bottle it says it works on NS2. So would it be okay to drain and refill with that fluid?
Those transmissions (JATCO) were poorly made to begin with. I would only go with the genuine Nissan OEM CVT fluid - not worth taking a chance with non-OEM regardless of the claims made. Also, you really should be changing the CVT fluid on those (drain and fill) every 30,000 miles max. That transmission is on burrowed time anyways, so you might as well do what you can to make it last a little longer; use the genuine fluid. Also baby it and don’t drive hard on it or tow anything.
CVT transmissions are touchy beasts. The genuine Nissan fluid is expensive, something like $20/quart. Drain & fill looks to be about 5.5 quarts so a bit over $100 in fluid. How much more will it cost to replace the transmission if the compatible 3rd-party fluid is not quite as compatible as it's cracked up to be?
