Hii! Me again with the 1984 Chrysler Executive, I decided to take the leap and change my what seems to be clean transmission fluid. From what the Haynes repair manual says, as well as various Chrysler dealer's old records pulled up, the car was made for Dexron II ATF fluid. Problem is, that wasn't made in 30+ years. I impressively found 1QT bottles (cans?) on Ebay very cheap, but should I even bother fluid that's been sitting in a can for 30+ years, and by the time I need to change the transmission fluid again years down the road, that may not even be available anymore... Does anyone know what would be safe to put in the transmission if not Dexron II, and for the time being, should I try this? -
I would NOT use oil that's been sitting for 30 years, even sealed. Besides, it's my understanding that all Dexron III and in fact, even Dexron VI is backward compatible all the way back to Dexron II. It's one of those relatively fewer things that GM has done right. The only exception, I believe, is for GM transmissions that use Dexron I.
I did further research and while Dexron III will seem to be 100% compatible, VI seems to not be *technically* compatible with Dexron II;
"This fluid is backward compatible with Dexron-III(H) and Dexron-III(G) fluids only. "
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEXRON#2005_%E2%80%93_DEXRON-VI(J)
Dexron III is also going to be old/sitting for a long time... man this is difficult lol
It also says the G & H fluids are compatible with all previous fluids.
The verbiage makes it trail instead of stating directly, it just makes it weird lol. Thank you both though! Sorry for being overly cautious, I'm trying to be at least decently careful with my driving museum piece
My daily driver calls for Dexron II and it works perfectly fine with Dex/Merc (Dexron III/Mercon). Although GM no longer licenses Dexron III it is still available. A gallon of Valvoline will set you back the princely sum of $14-$15 at Wal-Mart.
Thank you for the additional guidance! I ended up getting FRAM dexron iii fluid, I've never heard of the brand, but it was local, is FRAM decent or should I return that before I use it?
Thank you again guys!
It should be OK. Fram is known mainly for filters, they have no doubt sourced the Dexron III from a major oil producer such as Warren, Valvoline, etc. There may be an indication on the bottle of who actually manufactured it.