Nedoerr, I am inquiring why you are changing your pan? It is my understanding that the pan has a drain plug. I am only asking as I would hate to see you buy parts that you don't need to.

 

 

Nedoerr, what I find interesting is atleast for my year car, they mention nothing about changing out the filter. Is it a bad idea, probably not. But, most cars these days are built such that if you are getting particles into the filter of the tranny, your tranny is toast and will need a rebuild. Hence why they are getting away from making people change the filters. Besides, the "filters" on a tranny filter are a just a wire mesh and if you are thinking that it is going to stop the fine "dust" of the wearing bands, that will not be the case. The "filter" media that I have seen on other vehicles pretty much amounts to something similar to the screen that you have on your windows (a little finer though). But, I can understand why you may want to change it out. Just giving you information and letting you make your own decision.

 

Nedoerr, Good timing as I had just scheduled a transmission service at my dealer on Tuesday for next Wednesday. Had the parts department give me a quote for the parts and fluid. As my XJ is the 8 speed the parts are the same as you were recommended: So you might confirm that they are the same as you have a 6 speed trans.
Pan-sump: C2C38963 $ 248.20
Sleeve: C2C39599 $9.95
ATF fluid: JDE26444 $56.10/liter 7qt $392.70
I will be using the hard parts from the dealer, but purchased 7qt of ZF Fluid Guard 8 on Amazon for $165.32 or $23.62/qt.
My tech at the dealer said it would be 2 to 3 hours labor.
BTW I have 95,600 miles on my XJ that I ordered new.

 

Interesting!
So the 8 speed ZF still has the failing sleeve?
This was a well known problem for the 6 speed ZF.
I would have thought with the released updated sealing sleeve that the newer cars would not require it.
Is yours leaking?

Yes both the 6sp and 8sp have plastic pans with integrated filters.
Now if you want there are replacement metal pans as other applications use them. At least for the 6 speed I have not checked for the 8 speed.
It's a very common transmission used by dozens of car companies. With Ford making there own under license from ZF.
As far as I have seen all the fords still use a metal pan.

This place has all the parts and is very knowledgeable about ZF's. That's all they do.
I get my parts and fluid from them.

ZF Parts
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clubairth1 wish I had that link before i ordered my fluid, thanks.

 

No problem! I came from a 2005 S Type R so had the transmission serviced and went thru all the sealed for life stuff first.
This link was posted by someone else on the S Type forum. I got the entire kit and fluid for the best price anywhere.

The 6 speed had another problem with under sized pan bolts. ZF released a version with a larger head as a service part.
It was easy to strip out the Torx socket heads but since you were replacing the plastic pan anyway you could just tear the plastic away and use vice grips on the stubs.
Painful but it worked.

So on the 6 speed you needed to change the pan bolts out along with the new plastic pan/filter combo. Plus the electrical sealing sleeve which can only be changed when the transmission pan is dropped.
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Thanks for your post. I don't see a metal version of my pan on their website, but I am a bit of a luddite so may have missed it. Are the metal pans more reliable? Unfortunately I already bought a plastic one, so will use this one this time.

Incidentally, for the current ZF plastic one, it appears SNG Barratt is $22 cheaper and they suggest it is indeed the ZF part.

 

No need for the metal pan but when we first had talked about this years ago on the S Type forums there was a lot of complaining about the plastic pan and if it would hold up or not.
So people got looking and found a metal version. I kind of thought this too when I first saw the plastic pan but I ran my old STR to 132K miles with it and no problems.

So don't worry about it I just wanted to put all the options I knew about out there.
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Have you thought about pulling the transmission cooler line to get all the fluid? I dont think you get it all just dropping the pan?

I'm asking cause I am about to do the same thing. On my Equinox (i just did transmission) you pull the return cooler line from the transmission cooler. I basically ran a tube into that line and started the car. Let about a quart out and add a quart to the tranny. I did this till I got clean fluid running out of the transmission cooler. I don't know if anyone has done this or if you just drop the pan.

 

What seems to be missing from this discussion is the mileage on the car. ZF says at 75,000 miles. I did that with my JR and is running happily. The KR has a long way to go.

 

I thought the ZF 6 Speed recommendation was 8 year/80k. I just did my XK and plan on waiting a bit for the XJ.

 

Thanks for the post. Didn't think to check the ZF recommendations. My car has 82,000 miles on it. My mileage is in my signature line, but for some reason signatures don't show up on the mobile website. Thanks again.

 

Several problems with a flush.

Never sure exactly how it was done or how much fluid was changed.
No filter change so this is a no go for me. I never change any fluid that has a replaceable filter without also doing the filter. Plus I want to check the pan/filter for junk and clean the magnet in the pan as well. Note the magnet will be covered in a very fine black goo. This is powdered steel from transmission wear. Completely normal.
Finally you really should replace the electrical sealing sleeve. They just about all leak, they are cheap (About $15) and you can't change that item without dropping the pan anyway.

So a flush is quick and easy for the shop (no parts or skill because it's all the same for every car). It's not the best for the consumer. If you change the fluid several times you can get a more complete fluid change.

Another item to inspect are the cooler lines as the crimped steel connections to the rubber hoses sometimes will weep/seep. Jaguar's solution is complete replacement of the lines. This is NOT an easy job. So repairing the crimped connection can be done several ways.

Yes the ZF recommendations have changed as in the beginning they were pushing lifetime too. I was not aware of exactly what mileage was recommended. On the S Type form we seemed to find somewhere in the 60-85K miles range was reasonable.

Just a tip if you are running the 6 speed ZF. Mercon SP has been widely proven as a substitute for the magic juice Lifeguard fluid. Have not heard any suggestions for the 8 speed unit yet. Many on the S Forum have been running the Mercon SP with good results.
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Just wanted to post this info about a nice cast Aluminum pan for the ZF 8 Speed transmission. They now have replaceable transmission filters too. The ZF 8 speed is used on a huge number of cars and trucks so the after market has really jumped in. Especially since the Hellcats all use the 8 speed automatic. The diesels also got it so many more out there. All 8HP transmission share the same pan and filter regardless if they are attached to a 6 or 8 cylinder or a gas or diesel engine.

Aftermarket Al. pan adds 2 additional quarts of fluid to the system.
ZF 8 Speed Al. Pan

Dorman makes just the filter and gasket kit if you go to a metal pan. There are other suppliers too.
Filter and Gasket

Don't think I will bother to change from the plastic pan and integrated filter but nice to see all the options out there. I am at 50K miles so not really ready for a change yet but since I race it occasionally I do plan on an early transmission service. Hoping someone will figure out if there is a cheaper/easier to get fluid other than Lifeguard 8 too. I have found nothing yet.
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Interesting. Thanks for the heads-up, Club. I may look into this sometime next year.

For what its worth, I've been running Redline D6 fluid for 2 years and almost 20k miles with zero issues.

 

Good to know and I have been a fan of Redline for a long time too.
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