• Welcome to the Contour Enthusiasts Group, the best resource for the Ford Contour and Mercury Mystique.

    You can register to join the community.

Pennzoil GM synchro mesh vs OEM MTX trans fluid

I

Ifordman98

CEG'er
Joined
Sep 29, 2005
Messages
114
Location
South jersey
I was told that i can use the pennzoil GM synchro mesh by a fellow ceg'r instead of the oem mtx transaxle fluid. What is everyones opinion on this? I need this desperatley.
 
Ifordman98 said:
I was told that i can use the pennzoil GM synchro mesh by a fellow ceg'r instead of the oem mtx transaxle fluid. What is everyones opinion on this? I need this desperatley.
Click to expand...

no, the only alternative to the OEM Spec. is royal purple synchromax. the pennzoil, isn't designed for the soft metals found in our transmissions.
 
00TourSVT said:
no, the only alternative to the OEM Spec. is royal purple synchromax. the pennzoil, isn't designed for the soft metals found in our transmissions.
Click to expand...

This certainly isn't the prevalent feeling here. Where did you come up with this?

Here is a partial list of fluids found to be "satisfactory" and posted here over the years:

Mercon (original fill for several years, not bad but there are better fluids)

Mercon V

Ford Honey (Factory fill starting in very early 2000 and factory recommended as replacement of top off for earlier cars) (works great on my car and fully endorsed by Terry Haines) (Expensive at MSRP of about $20.00 a quart)

Any of the above with 2 oz of Ford Friction Modifier added. (Does improve shift quality but many feel that you should leave the chemistry modifications to the experts)

Torco (I forgot which part number) (All things Torco are absolutely excellent)

ATF+3 and ATF+4 (Chrysler spec ATF with a higher level of friction modifier than Mercon) (Works great on my car, almost as good as Ford Honey)

Pennzoil Synchro (shift or max? I don't remember the correct name) (Many have used it and reported good results) (Same product with different label as GM Synchro (shift or max, the opposite as Pennzoil)

Royal Purple (Many have used it and report that it works well. Evidently not as well as Torco or Ford Honey as reported from those that have tried Royal Purple as well as one of the others)

It should be noted that Royal Purple actually specifies one of their synthetic synthetic motor oils instead of gear oil. The chemistry of Ford Honey is more of a synthetic motor oil than it is a gear oil. Synthetic motor oil with a very high TBN to reduce sludge.

This next part is my opinion, based on my own research, and may not be the same as others here. Although Ford currently specifies a fluid for this trans that isn't much of a gear oil but has high resistance to sludge, there is no disadvantage (and some great advantage) to using a properly blended manual transmission specific gear oil.

Absolutely stay away from all things RedLine for this transmission, especially RedLine MTL. The longest thread ever (I think) at CEG was over trans failures from using RedLine MTL. It slugged up badly and plugged up the lubricant channels on the spyder gear shafts allowing severe wear on the shafts and severe trans failure.
 
i did lots and lots of researching and, as of now, Terry Haines only recommends either ford honey (which is the new factory spec with no friction modifier), or royal purple synchromax with no friction modifier (which is designed for manual trannies that called for automatic tranny fluid), or a 15W-40 synthetic diesel engine oil no friction modifier. The auto tranny fluid used for years works great for lubrication but "ATF over a period of time,causes build up of black oxides within the trans and affects the soft metal bushes on 'stoc' shift forks and causes them to become very stiff on the shafts", quote per TH.

i am not saying he is the end to end all arguments on the case, but he has had more experience with these trannies then anyone i know so i am just going with the best info i can get at the time.

sure our cars have run on the others for years and years, but why not use what is the latest and greatest spec for our vehicles at the time? you never know, it will probably change again!
 
Last edited:
...the short vid is a used(tight) shift fork on its shaft Vs a new shift fork(slides easy)This is the long term effect of any ATF fluid on the white metal bushes used on the MTX75 shaft forks. This was one of the main reasons Ford changed the spec. ATF fluids are a no no in an MTX75. Should also note that both the tight fork and the fork rod came from a customers trans that had issues with stiff shifting. From measurements, the rod was in spec, the tight fork was out of spec and the bush I.D. was too small Vs the size of the I.D. of the new fork used in the demo. Also note that just changing to a non ATF fluid only has a 50/50 chance of helping tight forks, once the bushes have expanded it's usually too late. Moral here is to stay away from all ATF fluids and F/mod..TH

And as posted before in case you guys missed it... ;)


http://www.fototime.com/BF5F5AF13B30AFD/conv.wmv
 
of course my car was run on ATF and friction modifier for years and seemed to work great! but after all the new news i threw it out and put in ford honey. then it was hard to shift when it was cold, i was guessing the bushings were of course swollen. you can really tell the shape your tranny when you get the ATF out of there. anyway, when i recently took the tranny out and changed my clutch i put Royal Purple Synchromax back in and it shifted like a dream again! so my personal choice is RPS as of now.
 
Use the Ford Honey and be done with it. The dealers will sell it for $17/qt. and the trans. takes 2.75 according to the manual.

Any one of the other fluids will cost about half as much so you'd save about $25-$30 which is... a tank of gas.

Fill it with the good stuff even if it's overpriced Ford stuff.
 
todras said:
...the short vid is a used(tight) shift fork on its shaft Vs a new shift fork(slides easy)This is the long term effect of any ATF fluid on the white metal bushes used on the MTX75 shaft forks. This was one of the main reasons Ford changed the spec. ATF fluids are a no no in an MTX75. Should also note that both the tight fork and the fork rod came from a customers trans that had issues with stiff shifting. From measurements, the rod was in spec, the tight fork was out of spec and the bush I.D. was too small Vs the size of the I.D. of the new fork used in the demo. Also note that just changing to a non ATF fluid only has a 50/50 chance of helping tight forks, once the bushes have expanded it's usually too late. Moral here is to stay away from all ATF fluids and F/mod..TH

And as posted before in case you guys missed it... ;)
Click to expand...



As a sample of one, this demonstration is statistically meaningless. Now if this was a common problem that would be another matter.

I hope this doesn't start another "endless" thread. The one that started with "watch out".
 
Big Jim said:
As a sample of one, this demonstration is statistically meaningless. Now if this was a common problem that would be another matter.
Click to expand...


I have 3 boxes of old forks in the shop,at least 50% are far tighter than a new stoc fork on the shift rod.If you want to prove this out Todd('one is hadly a sample etc!)...feel free to swing by and I can set you up with a chair and rod and you can test them all!...I can tell you that the worst ones are from MTX's that spent all their life in ATF!!...(BTW,around 500+ forks to check!!)TH
 
todras said:
I have 3 boxes of old forks in the shop,at least 50% are far tighter than a new stoc fork on the shift rod.If you want to prove this out Todd('one is hadly a sample etc!)...feel free to swing by and I can set you up with a chair and rod and you can test them all!...I can tell you that the worst ones are from MTX's that spent all their life in ATF!!...(BTW,around 500+ forks to check!!)TH
Click to expand...

Any idea how old the ATF was in those other transmissions? Had it ever been changed? Was the fluid "worn out" or "tired". Did any of them come out of transmissions that had friction modifier added?

I do know that when I was using Mercon, I noticed some improvement in shift quality immediately but it was short lived and never did feel as good as ATF+3 or Ford Honey.

Again, I don't feel that Mercon is the best fluid for that transmission. ATF+3 and ATF+4 is a cleaner fluid, better controlled base stocks used in blending, and a higher level of natural friction modifiers. Mercon V approaches ATF+3 and ATF+4 in characteristics and would probably be better than Mercon. I have driven SVTs with Mercon V and it felt pretty good. I haven't tried it in my own car.

What I most dislike about Ford Honey is that it is overpriced and Ford has kept alternate sources for it out of the US. The second thing I dislike is that it doesn't have hardly anything in the way of EP additives. Now I'm aware that they claim that none is needed, but there seems to be an attitude that ANY EP additive is harmful. That isn't correct. The wrong EP additives are not helpful and could be harmful, but a GL rated gear oil specifically blended for MANUAL transmission use would be the best. One that is synthetic, has a reasonable level of the right kind friction modifier, AND has high resistance to sludge should be ideal.

We have bigger issues to help each other with. My original comments on this thread was that there is not concurrence that Ford Honey and Royal Purple were the only two fluids to use. There are other good fluids available as well.

Most important, although Mercon isn't the best, it was factory specified for nearly the entire production life of the Contour. Even it isn't that bad if it is changed frequently enough.

Go back and look over the list from my first post on this thread again.
 
00TourSVT said:
of course my car was run on ATF and friction modifier for years and seemed to work great! but after all the new news i threw it out and put in ford honey. then it was hard to shift when it was cold, i was guessing the bushings were of course swollen. you can really tell the shape your tranny when you get the ATF out of there. anyway, when i recently took the tranny out and changed my clutch i put Royal Purple Synchromax back in and it shifted like a dream again! so my personal choice is RPS as of now.
Click to expand...

SAME story for me!! Except I also test drove RedLine MTL and it sucked too.

The Royal Purple has been, by far, the best choice over regular/synthetic ATX, Ford Honey, or RedLine.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top