- Scotty, Greetings from Canada, I have a 2013 Chevy Trax 1.4L 4 cylinder turbo with the Hydramatic 6 speed automatic transmission. I have about 26000 miles on it and I only drove about 6000 miles in the past year. How often should I have the transmission fluid changed or the transmission serviced given the low amount of yearly mileage?
I would recommend to change transmission fluid (drain and fill, including filter change if it’s readily accessible/serviceable) — esp. on those GM vehicles — every 40,000 miles. However, in your case it’s already been 8 years and fluids don’t last forever, so probably a good idea to do it now.
From this point onward, since you put 6,000 miles on it a year that means every 6-7 years (which comes to 40,000 miles) you would change the transmission fluid.
I haven’t seen any articles that look at how transmission fluid degrades with time, but what I specified above is probably a good time to change it anyways.
that's a really good answer. complete and to the point.
Whatever the owner's manual tells you is required in the maintenance section.
So normally I'd agree, but the owner's manual says to replace the fluid at 97, 500 miles under normal conditions and 45, 000 miles under "severe" conditions - which I guess is if the transmission is shifting horribly. No mention on the time though, and the car is a little over 8 years old now. I'd rather be on the conservative side maintenance-wise considering this is a GM product made in Mexico.
I'd go with the 45K mile option.
Sounds good. Will go with that, it's shifting well now, but I'm also trying to baby it so that it lasts as much as it can considering used car prices right now.
I cant speak much for a new-ish car bc i have older cars. Id say if 55-65k would be on the safe side, but modern fluids are pretty good so it could go longer and not show problems. I had mine serviced at 75k & it was still in great shape. Thats not a big car, and a small engine so it really wont be overly strained much. If you ask the dealer & they say life time fluid just walk away. Fluids are cheap, transmissions are not.
