Transmission Fluid Debate conclusion M6 A8

So I've spent the last week off and on reading thru forums and watching YouTube in order to select which transmission fluid to use. I created this thread so that it might save some of you the work. Since about 1999-2000 Mopar has recommended ATF+4 exclusively for all their vehicles. I'll post a link but basically there seems to be 2 criteria to earn the certification. 1) It has to use a group 3 base oil, in which there are 4 groups and the 4th being to most chemically engineered or synthetic. There are only a handful of approved refineries they're allowed to get this base oil from. 2) It has it has to use a specific concoction of additives that has to be from Lubrizol. They supposedly randomly test the fluids on their approved list for quality control. https://www.allpar.com/threads/chry...uids-7176-atf-3-atf-4.230008/#post-1085224106
Now there's a long lasting debate on whether or not ATF+4 is synthetic or not. The other debate is if there is any difference in any of these ATF+4 fluids as Mopars specs might not leave any room for a secret sauce that may distinguish one from another. Feel free to fight it out in the comments, I'm not going to get into that. Just try and not get overly worked up like I've seen in dozens of threads. Really who cares what someone else puts in their cars. All I will say is that as long as it's ATF+4 you can be certain that it won't affect your warranty. Now I don't have an opinion on if it's synthetic or not but I will say I initially thought it was all just a ploy to push their own proprietary fluid on us using fear tactics. However after looking into it more it does seem to be good stuff and there's merit to it actually being a quality standard. To summarize the second debate, some ppl feel that there's no difference between Walmart brand and the biggest most expensive names except the price and bottle. Their argument is all AFT+4 fluids are the same. Ofc you can conclude what kind of push back the other side of the debate might have. Group 4 base oils are superior. However I don't think they can be certified ATF+4 if they're used. Also not all of these certified brands claim to be fully synthetic. So that's something else to look out for. I couldn't find any real tests done on transmission fluids so all we have to go on is testimony from ppl like us in forums like this. I know I didn't leave you with a brand recommendation but I will leave a list of all of the approved ATF+4 options. I personally will still be a brand whore and go with a ATF+4 certified fluid that states its fully synthetic clearly. The Mopar brand does state clearly that its fully synthetic on the box. I initially was going to go Mobil1 Synthetic ATF in the silver bottle but only their blue bottle regular Mobil multi vehicle is certified ATF+4. One last thing, another opinion a lot of ppl share is that a multi vehicle fluid is trying to do too many things and that by trying to cover so many specs it's inherently mediocre at all of them. For what it's worth I'm in that camp myself. I've also read that the carbon blockers used in the synchros don't like synchromesh fluid and that it will cause them to degrade. I couldn't find any industry statements on this, i won't chance it tho. My Hellcat is a M6 and the fluid is recommended to be changed every 48kmi. However I've heard from many ppl and have seen pics that it turns brown and burnt looking way sooner than that. I'm coming up on 10kmi and how it looks will determine the next time I'll change it. If it looks good I'll stretch it to 25kmi. Hope this helped
https://www.centerforqa.com/licensed-atf4-brands/

Exactly how often are people changing or adding ATF to their cars? I've not seen this debate anywhere.
I personally would just use whatever the manufacturer used originally. They put a lot of time and money into research and deciding what is best to put in the vehicles that they have to warranty, it's their reputation and profits on the line if they don't work superior to anything else.




Also where is the fun in not getting overly worked up? You have been on this forum before...correct?




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That's all I'm sayin

My thinking on it is my Hellcat has a lot more in common with the ZL1 Camero or Gt500 than the neon or town and country but whatever fluid you have left over from filing ur PT Cruiser, u can dump right in ur Viper ACR. Also autos are pressurized and manuals are not. It seems logical that higher performance cars would need different fluids.

M6 here - replaced the factory ATF with the TREMEC high performance fluid. Smoother for sure. Recommend you take the cross member out unless you want to clean up a mess.

I decided on the Pennzoil Platinum ATF+4. I was thinking the rear diff oil would be easy but I can't make myself pull the trigger on the AMSOil severe duty. $60 just seems crazy for 2 quarts to me. Did u add the fluid thru the top or pump it thru?

I hear ya. Seems high performance lubricants are not inexpensive but the HC is worth every penny. Manually pumped by hand into the case fill port.

CAUTION: Some of the usual folks here will have fun with that last sentence. Just wait for it .....

While I agree that those are two different needs as far as vehicles performance I was stating that I usually stick with whatever brand the manufacturer put in our Hellcats! I’m sure they have it figured out to keep from paying warranty claims for trans failures.

I also agree that high performance fluids are worth the money. I just lost a lifted in my 13 Ram 1500 with a 5.7 hemi at 188,500 miles, I changed it over to Royal Purple the day I bought it and have not had any issues until just a few weeks ago. I understand that this is a common failure with way less mileage, like under 100k