Back to all

The Tuffy Tire & Auto Service Center Waukesha Guide to Caring for Your Transmission

March 31, 2024

Most vehicles have automatic transmissions, yet a lot of Waukesha drivers only have a fuzzy understanding about what a transmission does. Think back to the last time you rode a bike in Waukesha. You started out in a lower gear and shifted to higher gears as you went faster. Down shift for hills, stuff like that. Think of your legs as the engine – there's an ideal speed you can pedal and you change gears to leverage the work you're doing.

Lower gears for power on hills or for starting out. Higher gears for more speed. That's what the automatic transmission does – it automatically starts in lower gears and shifts up to higher gears to go faster on Wisconsin roads. And it automatically shifts back down to climb Waukesha hills, pass or start up again.

Vehicle automatic transmissions have certainly gotten more sophisticated in recent years. They have more speeds than before: the base is four speeds, five is very common.

At Tuffy Tire & Auto Service Center Waukesha, we routinely service transmissions with six speeds and several have seven or even eight speeds. As you can imagine, this means more parts. Any they all have to fit into roughly the same space.

Transmissions are computer controlled these days, with some high end transmissions having two or three computers. Transmissions are engineered to last. But they are also engineered to tighter tolerances. If a portion of the transmission is starved for lubrication, it can lead to failure.

Not enough fluid can starve the transmission, or dirty transmission fluid can clog small passages in the transmission. Then the lubricant is blocked and can't get to all the parts to protect them, so they wear out prematurely. The technicians at Tuffy Tire & Auto Service Center Waukesha see far too many transmissions that needlessly failed due to neglect.

And, as you can imagine, repairing one of these new transmissions at any Waukesha service center can be quite costly. That's why owner’s manuals have a schedule for how often you should change the fluid and what type of fluid to use.

It's really important for Waukesha area drivers to carefully follow the manufacturer's transmission service schedule.

At Tuffy Tire & Auto Service Center Waukesha in Waukesha, we hope you never become shiftless in Waukesha because you didn't take care of your transmission.

Tuffy Tire & Auto Service Center Waukesha
S31 W24721 Sunset Drive
Waukesha, Wisconsin 53189
262-513-9500

 

More articles from Tuffy Waukesha

Let?s Shift Gears (Transmission Fluid Replacement)

February 16, 2025

If you have a vehicle with an automatic transmission, you probably never think about gear shifting. When motor vehicles were invented, all of them had to be shifted manually. But that wonderful self-shifting transmission, referred to these days as simply an automatic, changed everything. Automa... More

Getting Off to a Running Start (Starter Replacement)

February 9, 2025

When you start your vehicles engine, theres another motor that makes that whole process possible. Its called the starter, and its a small electric motor that gets your vehicle running. As you can imagine, its quite a chore for a little electric motor to turn over the big engine that powers you... More

Keeping Your Cool (Coolant leak repair)

February 2, 2025

If theres one thing you should pay attention to with your vehicle, its the temperature gauge. Its the one that may say C---H (that means cold---hot). Or maybe yours has a picture of a thermometer on it and a blue and red zone. If you see the needle heading farther to the H or red area, that mea... More