Hi Scotty,
I recently did an automatic transmission drain and refill in my wife's 2014 Mazda CX5 GT using Aisin ATF-MFZ. I bought 4 quarts, and used ~3.5L. Three of the bottles were red in fluid color and one was blue. I checked the bottles and they were word for word identical and just figured that the company sold the ATF in both red and blue color and I was sent one of the blue ones by chance, but now I'm second guessing myself. Should I drain and refill again? Or is my transmission OK?
Thanks,
Mike
Aisin's product announcement for that fluid says it's supposed to be blue. The color is a dye. Maybe they changed it after the initial production run? Are there manufacturing dates, lot numbers, etc. on the bottles?
https://www.aisinlatinamerica.com/uploads/v7pqio6a_ATF-MFZ_Product_Annoucement_copy.pdf
Unfortunately, no lot numbers on the bottles, but I just double checked and they are all identical. Since the bottles were identical I was pretty confident that I likely just got stuck between lots and that the fluids were identical, but now I'm second guessing. The only relevant thing I could find was on an online forum:
"I saw a little while ago that Aisin started making FZ equivalent transmission fluid. My 14 quart order arrived today and it’s currently running about $8-9 a quart at RockAuto. It was $20 shipped to me for the entire order. I saw one report here and another mention at BITOG that the fluid may be red. I can confirm that the fluid I received today (Aisin ATF-MFZ) is actually blue."
Just found one more post on a Mazda forum that I figured I'd put in this thread in case someone else runs into a similar issue:
"I'm actually quite tempted to know whether or not the AISIN ATF MFZ would be a suitable replacement. Based on what I've read on other forums, the dye is a red color. I guess the only way to find out would be to send the Mazda ATF FZ and the AISIN ATF MFZ samples in for an analysis to see the composition of the fluid..."
Seems like they made it both red and blue and I had the bad luck of receiving both to confuse the hell out of me.