Changed the oil and filter. It was long overdue, but seeing as I haven't driven much in the last 10 months I wasn't too worried. New Toyota filter and Mobil 1. Old oil looked pretty good.
Decided to do the
@2001LC drain and fill of my transmission, because I couldn't find any concrete record of it being done. 1 hour job and maybe change diff fluid while I'm under the truck, as I planned, turned into and 8 hour ordeal.
The tranny drain plug gave me the dreaded resistance on the way out. The drain plug was indeed all mangled and cross threaded. Since it was Sunday, no dealer was open to try to find a new plug from Toyota/Lexus, so I went to Napa to find suitable replacements. Spent an hour there trying to find something, to the bemusement of the staff. The M10 plug I found went in and just spun in place, even with the freshly chased threads. Ending up having to tap it to a larger M12 and used a plug and gasket similar to the oil drain, which snugged up nice at 20Nm. Lots of grease, frequent cleaning, and more grease on the tools, to slowly get the new threads cut. I thought I had the correct replacement plug before I started, but the one I ordered was way too big.
It was 60° out yesterday, today it was 39° and raining all day, with 3-12 inches of wet snow Wednesday... so I wanted to get it buttoned up before the weather hit. A new pan would have been my preference, but time/weather constraints and the facts that it was in the middle of my driveway made me fix it in situ.
The worst part is that the fluid looked super clean as it came out and looked nice and red on a white towel. Oh well. Last guy who changed the fluid didn't explicitly mark it in the maintenance history anywhere and most likely over torqued and/or cross threaded it. The lesson it to always have extra parts on hand before you start a project.
Thanks for the advice and tips for others that had similar issues.
Pic one shows a clean magnet, and those waiting to be cleaned. Bottom is strainer, after I swiped a microfiber across to gauge sludge build up.
