Let Me Know if You Have Allison Transmission Fluid Questions

[hzjcm8]

Hi all,

I've just joined Good Sam Club. I was the former Transmission Fluids Engineer at Allison Transmission. I held that position from 1990 until my retirement in 2009. Let me know if you have questions about TranSynd, the TES-295 specification or just anything to do with automatic transmission fluids. I'm here to help.

[RCtime]

Hi Tom and welcome. Your expertise is of great value.

I have the allison 3000 which I changed over to tranSynd 2 yrs ago and about 12,000 miles ago. I believe a standard filter.
When should I expect to change the fluid again? This year I dont expect to put over 4000 miles on it.
My dipstick reads full but my shift pad says 1 qt low. Should I add a quart?
Where can you get TranSynd labels to attatch to your filler tube so anyone can tell your running TranSynd and not Dexron?

Well you asked for it.

Thank you so much.

[Grant_Lasson]

I have a 4000 series (circa 2001)in my coach. Transynd was installed about 18 months ago. By the time the 4 years has passed, I'll be lucky to have 20 to 25K miles on the Transynd.

Will you share with us how and where to get the Transynd tested and what results we should be looking for? At Camp Freightliner they were pretty insistent that the oil needs to be changed at 4 years. That seems wasteful if there is a good way to ensure that it is still functioning correctly.

Thanks for sharing your knowledge with us,

Grant

[Community Alumni]

Sully2 wrote:

hzjcm8 wrote:
Hi all,

I've just joined Good Sam Club. I was the former Transmission Fluids Engineer at Allison Transmission. I held that position from 1990 until my retirement in 2009. Let me know if you have questions about TranSynd, the TES-295 specification or just anything to do with automatic transmission fluids. I'm here to help.

Welcome aboard Tom. Its always super nice ( and greatly helpful) to have a WORKING PROFESSIONAL.

Unlike all of us old NON-WORKING UNPROFESSIONALS eh Sully. :W


hzjcm8
Tom, welcome to the forum; I just love my Allison 2000 in our HR Admiral.

[wny_pat1]

hzjcm8 wrote:
it's formulated with only PAO (polyalphaolefin) base oils

Thank you for pointing that out. So many refiners out there don't seem to want to talk about this kind of stuff.

[hzjcm8]

TranSynd is only available through the Allison dealer distributor network.

[hzjcm8]

TES-389 is strictly DEXRON-IIIH fluids. I wrote the specification after Allison had Viton seal problems with DEXRON-VI. We wanted to "weed out" any DEXRON-IIIH that had the same seal compatibility issues as DEXRON-VI. The TES-389 specification required proof of a DEXRON-IIIH license plus running of a special Viton seal test. Any DEXRON-IIIH products that passed the tests were granted the TES-389 approval.

TES-389 is not as good at TES-295 fluids. Much less oxidation resistance and tons more viscosity loss. That's why the drain intervals are so much shorter for TES-389 fluids.

[hzjcm8]

Cooling efficiency is affected by ambient temperature so I would think 220F is reasonable for a 100F ambient.

[hzjcm8]

Amsoil has never ran against the TES-295 spec to my knowledge. I was never asked to test it.

[ticat900]

randallb wrote:
hzjcm,
When my 340HP Cummins/2500 Allison combo was new the trans seemed to run extremely cold. As the mileage increased (32,000 now) the operating temp seemed to increase to the 150F range. Last August running from Yuma to San Diego I saw temps in excess of 210F. Is this a normal operating temp in 100F ambient?
Randy

Iam On my 3rd DP with cummins/Allison 3000 trans and they all run 180-210 dpending on loads and hills and weather temps.I have never seen one run 150 in these conditions.

[randallb]

hzjcm,
When my 340HP Cummins/2500 Allison combo was new the trans seemed to run extremely cold. As the mileage increased (32,000 now) the operating temp seemed to increase to the 150F range. Last August running from Yuma to San Diego I saw temps in excess of 210F. Is this a normal operating temp in 100F ambient?
Randy

[krivanj]

My service guy just changed mine with Amsoil synthetic. It says it is the ts 389 spec, which my Allison manual says is not as good as the 295 spec but is okay. Is this correct?

[ticat900]

Triker33 wrote:
For the average MH that only puts on 3-4k miles a year.

Isn't the Allison 36 month filter change and 48 month fluid change of the TES-295 in a 3060MH transmission a bit of overkill.

If you never saw any sign of oxidation or shear under hard use.
Why not let MH go 60-72 months(up to 25,000 miles) before changing filter/fluid?

You can go a lot lot further than 25K miles on transynd in a allison 3060 MHDP transmission

[smlranger]

Thanks for joining the forum and offering to help.

Last fall I replaced the Dexron in my 3000MH Allison with synthetic. It was done by the Freightliner RV chassis service center in Gaffney, SC. They used Mobil Delvac synthetic transmission fluid saying it met the Allison specs.

These folks service a lot of motorhomes so I am trusting they used the correct fluid.

[H345]

Could a TES-295 or TranSynd be used in the new Ford 6 speed trans ? Thanks

[The_Texan]

I have one question, as I have heard yes and no. Does Amsoil synthetic ATF meet the TES-295 specs?