Chnage intervals on spinon transmission filter.

[xnighter]

I have a subaru outback with a spinon filter on transmission.
I did a complete ATF exchange with amsoil through cooler line at 40,000 miles so the initial break in wear should be all gone. I am planning on doing one drain&refill (about 4 quarts) every 30,000 miles from now on. So there are acouple of questions I have for the resident amsoil product specialists:

1)do you think i can keep amsoil filter for 30,000 miles or is it too long? I am currently using EA15K13 amsoil filter.
2)Does ATF has more or less wear particles than engine oil?(I have seen some exceptionally clean reports after the initial fill with all the breakin wear has been exchanged)
3)would you agree that since ATF does not have byproducts of combustion and ATF is cleaner than engine oil 15,000 miles or one year limit does not apply to this filter?

PS: I don't make short trips or a lot of city driving, but I do have cold winters though.

Thank you very much for input.

 

[LargeCarManX2]

I have a few questions:

1. Did you place a bypass head and amsoil oil filter as your transmission filter?

2. Is this set up spliced into the cooler line for the atf to cooler circuit?

If your answers are yes to the above questions, my reply would be....

Amsoil will wash their hands if a filter is not used within the parameters of it's intent: However, the heavy duty eao should go 30K in my opinion. I personally would do this....change the filter every 15K top off the atf and continue until you reach 100K, then do a full service.

 

[flstffxe]

The Subaru spin on trans filter is not the same as an engine oil filter. It is more of a bypass filter then a standard spin-on engine oil filter.

The bypass valve is replaced with a stainless steel mesh screen which takes a large portion of the flow and still catches larger debris. A lesser portion of the flow travels through the typical filter media. It would seem that Subaru valued flow VS total filtration in this case.
http://www.subaruoutback.org/forums/66-p...-different.html

Engine oil filter left, trans filter right.

Trans filter screen in place of bypass valve.

 

[Trav]

I like your plan it sounds solid.
No problem i can see with the spin on for 30K as you say there are no combustion by products in the transmission fluid but there is some friction disk material and some wear metals.
These shouldn't come close to overwhelming this type of filter in 30K.

 

[flstffxe]

Originally Posted By: LargeCarManX2
I have a few questions:

1. Did you place a bypass head and amsoil oil filter as your transmission filter?

2. Is this set up spliced into the cooler line for the atf to cooler circuit?

If your answers are yes to the above questions, my reply would be....

Amsoil will wash their hands if a filter is not used within the parameters of it's intent: However, the heavy duty eao should go 30K in my opinion. I personally would do this....change the filter every 15K top off the atf and continue until you reach 100K, then do a full service.


Some Subaru autos use a spin-on trans filter. It has the same diameter gasket and thread pitch as the oil filter so some oil filter manufactures spec a standard spin-on oil filter as a replacement.

WIX specs the 51365 for the transmission.

AMSOIL specs the WIX 51365 for the transmission,
and EA15K12 for both the engine oil and transmission filter application.

Personal opinion, a engine oil filter has no place in this application. If Jatco and Subaru thought a spin-on engine oil filter with a bypass valve was acceptable they would have used the same oil filter for both the engine and transmission, they don't. The filter was also eliminated all together for 2009 and later 4EATs leaving only the one in the pan.

 

[xnighter]

the answer is no to both questions. Some Subaru transmissions were designed with a filter which you can be screwed onto transmission housing. I too would like to use a larger filter without doing any extra modifications, but to my knowledge EA15K13 is the biggest one that fits. They used to be rated 15,000 severe, 40,000 miles normal, but downgraded to 15,000. I think when they were downgraded the problem was not the filter, but some engines are prone to sludging and on extra long drain intervals that became apparent so the answer was to reduce oil and filter change intervals.

 

[xnighter]

Great pictures. I think you are basically correct, but i think engineers have to assume that people will neglect the maintenance, hence a big hole instead of bypass valve while you still get some partial filtration through filter element. I am on the other hand ready to be anal about maintenance : ) I think the filter element is the same though for transmission and engine filter. This way subaru can say that this filter is maintenance free and when the filter element is plugged up, ATF simply goes straight into the hole where bypass valve used to be. This way catastrophic transmission failure is avoided.

 

[xnighter]

Originally Posted By: LargeCarManX2
I have a few questions:

1. Did you place a bypass head and amsoil oil filter as your transmission filter?

2. Is this set up spliced into the cooler line for the atf to cooler circuit?

If your answers are yes to the above questions, my reply would be....

Amsoil will wash their hands if a filter is not used within the parameters of it's intent: However, the heavy duty eao should go 30K in my opinion. I personally would do this....change the filter every 15K top off the atf and continue until you reach 100K, then do a full service.


the answer is no to both questions. Some Subaru transmissions were designed with a filter which you can be screwed onto transmission housing. I too would like to use a larger filter without doing any extra modifications, but to my knowledge EA15K13 is the biggest one that fits. They used to be rated 15,000 severe, 40,000 miles normal, but downgraded to 15,000. I think when they were downgraded the problem was not the filter, but some engines are prone to sludging and on extra long drain intervals that became apparent so the answer was to reduce oil and filter change intervals.

 

[xnighter]

sorry 15,000 severe, and 25,000 miles normal, confused miles and km.

 

[Donald]

Given what I have observed in a Magnefine in 40K miles I would guess you could go 50K miles. True the spin-on filter probably filters to a smaller micron rating than the Magnefine (30 microns).

 

[Eddie]

My Forester manual stated NO AT filter change needed except if filter is damaged. I fnailly changed mine at 100,000 miles out of fear and cut it open. Very close inspection with a 10 power magnifer showed absolulty problems in the pleats. Subaru knows what they suggest in my opinion. I did chage the ATF at 25K and 75K and sold the vehicle running like new at ~ 134,000 miles.

 

[xnighter]

Originally Posted By: Eddie
My Forester manual stated NO AT filter change needed except if filter is damaged. I fnailly changed mine at 100,000 miles out of fear and cut it open. Very close inspection with a 10 power magnifer showed absolulty problems in the pleats. Subaru knows what they suggest in my opinion. I did chage the ATF at 25K and 75K and sold the vehicle running like new at ~ 134,000 miles.

This is why it was illiminated in some newr models. Whith a hole in place of the bypass there was very little atf actually going through pleats. Did u change atf completely or just drain & refill? Thanks.

 

[ZeeOSix]

Originally Posted By: Eddie
My Forester manual stated NO AT filter change needed except if filter is damaged. I fnailly changed mine at 100,000 miles out of fear and cut it open. Very close inspection with a 10 power magnifer showed absolulty problems in the pleats.


What kind of problems did you see?

 

[flstffxe]

^^^ I believe that is a typo. I think it was intended to say:

"inspection with a 10 power magnifer showed absolulty NO problems in the pleats."

 

[Al]

Originally Posted By: xnighter
Great pictures. I think you are basically correct, but i think engineers have to assume that people will neglect the maintenance, hence a big hole instead of bypass valve while you still get some partial filtration through filter element.
I think they do it bc they want the same amount of flow and pressure even as the filter loads up. The ATF needs very very little filtering as evidenced by them discontinuing it during the 2008 year.

Even if only 1% of the flow actually gets filtered on every pass I am guessing that is more than satisfactory.