Douglas61

Thanks vandal968 for starting this thread and sharing your experience! I have a simple question: here you mentioned clutch fluid. Do you mean transmission and transmission fluid can run for 14 years?

Petza914

He means the fluid used by the hydraulic clutches in a manual transmission car, which is often shared with the brake fluid, but sometimes has it's own separate system with it's own reservoir. Sometimes the clutch slave is self-bleeding, like on a 997.2 car or has to be manually bled, like on the 997.1 and most earlier cars (928, probably the 968, etc).

Cars with a cable actuated clutch (like the 914) don't have clutch fluid as the clutch is purely mechanical without hydraulic assist.

vandal968

Yup. What Petza914 said.

cheers,
c

Douglas61

Thanks Petza914 for quick reply. now i am not confused. I got my Cayenne 2008 base tiptronic last month and it has 60k miles, no service record found. The car runs great, a bit shaky when doing sharp turns in park lots and random bird chirping noise on the road. As a new hand on Cayenne, I am finding out what to look for potential maintenance work. Any recommendations?... Thanks a bunch!

Petza914

Has anyone catalogued the specs of the drain plugs in these different components? I think magnetic drain plugs are a great idea in general when there are ferrous components that wear to prevent the metal from continuing to circulate in the fluid and am wondering if any have the same spec as the 997 engine oil drain plug, which is an M18x1.5. I ask because LN Engineering is doing a 20% off sale for November and I was going to order as many as will fit into the Cayenne differential, transfer cases, etc so I can install them when I do my fluid changes.

Thanks.

killer2001

My old crusty 1989 Nissan 240sx has OEM magnetic drain plugs for the differential and transmission. Would be nice to have this upgrade.

vandal968

Petza, I was starting to look into it, but it seemed like a couple of sizes weren't available. If you figure out sources for all the different types, please post them.

Maybe a group buy?

cheers,
c

jeff spahn

Couldn't you put a rare earth magnet on the plug and call it good?

Petza914

If the plug is steel and not aluminum, sure you could. I always worry about a steel plug in an aluminum casing - not only do you have dissimilar metals reacting with each other, but you also have the opportunity for the harder plug to strip the threads or crack the softer case. Aluminum cases should have aluminum plugs in them IMO.

vandal968

The factory plugs are allen key, so the ones I've seen so far (engine x2, rear diff) are already hollowed out 3/4 of the way thru, so there really isn't enough meat left to drill a hole for a magnet.

cheers,
c

Petza914

sticking the magnet to the plug (if it's ferrous) will make the whole plug magnetic - no need to drill a hole and not a good idea to do that.

vandal968

Yup, that's a good idea. I used to stick a strong magnet to the outside of my oil filter, same idea. My 944 came with one and it always had a noticeable amount of metal dust on it. The thing that I always wondered was whether the dust stayed on the magnet while the engine was running or if it got whipped into the oil only to settle back down on the magnet once the engine was off. I wish there was an easy way to know what really happens, because if it's only on there once the engine's off, it would be pointless. I favor the ones with the recessed magnet and deep counterbore for that reason. It seems that if the metal dust is sheltered in a little cutout, it would be much more likely to stay put.

cheers,
c

cheers,
c

Douglas61

Following this thread for engine oil, I recently pulled out the dip stick on my Cayenne V6 3.6 engine and found the level was consistently half an inch above max... I think the previous owner over-filled the engine oil. I guess I should get worried and plan to drain some oil out soon. Does anyone know how much was overfilled in my case, or how much I should drain off? Thanks!

vandal968

Douglas61, if it were me, I'd just use the mityvac a suck a little out until the level was correct. Great tool to have.

vandal968

I decided on Amsoil for the tranny and diff since their ATF discussed above covers both specs. Amsoil is a bit weird to order from, you can either pay list price and get free shipping, or you can become a "member" $10 for 6months, no free shipping, but it saves you about 25%, so well worth it once you get up to around $100 worth of oil. They have a 2.5gal container (10qts) which is more than enough to do xfer case and transmission (most transmission oil-change kits come with 9qts). It discounts down to about $100 with membership (down from $131 msrp), shipping was only $12. I also got 2 qts of severe gear 75w90 since I was already paying for shipping.

I changed the rear diff a few weeks ago with Redline 75w90, old oil was blackish, but no glitter. The front diff was also blackish but with a small amount of very fine glitter in it, so the front does appear to wear faster than the rear as others have said. It took a little less than 1qt of the Amsoil Severe gear 75w90 . While I was under there I attempted to swap the transfer case fluid, the fill plug came out with great effort and took some damage to the hex, the drain would not come out at-all. Dealership does NOT have the plugs in stock (WTF?), they'll be in on Tuesday, so I decided to just top off the transfer case for now and attack it again next week when I do the transmission fluid change. It has a stated capacity of 0.9qts (28.8oz), and it took approximately 7oz of fluid top-off*, so it was down by 24%! yet the outside of the transfer case is clean and bone dry, not sure where it went.

So I've got a couple of days to hear great ideas for removing that stuck drain. It already withstood kroil, propane heat (exciting with a leaking fuel flange) taps with a hammer and impact gun. That red sealant that Porsche uses on those plugs is a nightmare.

cheers,
c

*measured by the lines on a high-precision red Solo cup.