Avalon Transmission Whine

gear wine is a sure sign that your transmissions is wearing out prematurely. How many miles are on the vehicle? Mostly city or highway driven? Severe climate where you live? Freezing temperatures, heat topping 100 in the summer?

Wouldn't hurt to install an oversized transmission cooler once the warranty is expired. It's heat that kills transmissions and contaminates the fluid rapidly. The larger trans cooler would prevent that.

East-

How often have you changed the fluid?

thought i might have been overly sensitive in noticing a whine sound in the tranaxle under load - expecting most would write it off as normal i added lucas transmission fix - no solvents or particulate additives - to quiet the sound - which it did. then more recently, started using lesser quantities (8 oz.) ( i regularly drain and replace the fluid) and the noise has just slightly begun to reappear, so it seems the concentration is now just right.

The 2000 Avalon has 75,000 miles on it, but I bought it less than a year ago from the local Toyota dealer at 70,000 miles. They had obtained the car by auction, so had no service records for it. Apparently the previous owner had not maintained the car properly, as shortly after I bought it, I notice grey smoke at start up and high oil consumption on the highway. To make a long story short, Toyota replaced the engine (short block) and replaced the valve covers which had bad baffles (all done under the extended care warranty that I had bought with the car). That fixed the oil problem, it hasn't used a drop since.

I noticed the whine and the fact that the transmission oil was dark (did not smell burned, however). Toyota diagnosed the whine as coming from the transmission, and recommended a transmission flush (with BG additive) followed by a couple of thousand miles of operation to see if that helped. It didn't. So the car is back at Toyota today.

Merritt

Since the motor was beat up so was the transmission. Hopefully you get a new one.

The oil consumption problem sounded like your engine had an early form of oil sludge. Good thing they took care of it or you'll have a blown engine seizing up on you on the highway. It's a known problem with these Toyota engines.

As far as the transmission goes, many of them whine, even when owners change ATF regularly. So it must be a design issue with the inexpensive Aisin transmissions. If you think the 2000 is bad, wait til you get a

2002+, many of them jerk when down shifting as if trying to find the right gear. Then Toyota threw out 20% of the parts on the 2007 tranny to reduce weight ("increase performance" they said). We'll see.

Most of the Camrys I know are sold around 60-70K miles. A friend had one til 120K and he needed a $2,500 tranny rebuild because OD was slipping.

I always say to change out the strainer screen while at an ATF change. Don't just clean it because you can't really clean the screen inside the strainer casing effectively (think a dealer tech rushing your job). It's expensive at the dealer for a new strainer, but a Fram kit with a new strainer and cork-rubber gasket is about $20.

Merritt Mullen wrote:

Yeah, I know all about the sludge issue. Got a real education (both me and the dealer). Turned out the primary cause of the oil consumption and smoke on start up was clogged baffles in the valve covers. Got a full engine rebuild (including factory rebuilt short block), and still had the oil problem. That is when I told the dealer about the baffle issue (that I learned about from this group). New valve covers fixed the problem. I think they are kicking themselves for not just replacing the valve covers, which probably would have cured the symptoms. But I am happy to have a new engine. Hasn't used a drop of oil since.

The dealer service department called today and said Toyota had approved the rebuild of the transmission. They know they need to replace certain parts, but need to tear it down to check for worn bearings, etc., or anything else that needs fixing at the same time.

I sold my 87 Camry just last year with 135,000 miles on it. Still drove and looked almost like a new car. It did have a bit of automatic transmission whine as well, but with no warranty to pay for the fix, I could live with it.

In the case of my Avalon, the extended care warranty runs out in June, so I wanted to fix it while the warranty was still good.

Merritt

Good thing you have the extended warranty and that Toyota is willing to fix BOTH the engine and transmission under that. Good deals -- car with newly rebuilt engine/tranny and extended warranty that's about to run out in a couple of months!

So Daniel, now you know the tranny whine is attributed to certain parts that Toyota knows about.

For those owners with extended warranties: get it fixed. I guess for others fixing it or selling it before it breaks is now an option.

Merritt Mullen wrote: