[TallTravel]

Greetings to all the forum members!

My 5 speed '01 330ci, which has mainly highway miles for its 158,000 miles, has not yet had fluids replaced in the transmission. Each time I've suggested changing all the fluids--other than a regular oil change at 7500 miles--both the dealer and the independent BMW repair place claim it is not necessary. They keep fighting me on this, and say they believe the manual transmission is best left sealed, airtight, with the original fluid.

Clearly, this is not the same as dealers telling us the engine oil only needs to be changed every 15,000 miles. This is different, right?

But should the transmission oil have been changed already? How often, for mainly highway miles, would forum members recommend changing the transmission fluid?

[jimk]

I change mine every 30,000 miles no matter what the car is. Try Red Line MTL or Royal Purple Synchromax. Just as fyi, the more appropriate board for your car is at e46fanatics.com.

GL,
Jim

[Spec 1]

I just changed mine at the 160k mark for the first time (E30) and the manual transmission fluid was garbage. It needed a replacement probably around 120k. I would recommend having them do it anyway. With E46's they have to physically pump the fluid up and into the transmission case out of the drain hole, so it's unfortunately something the dealer will have to do.