DSG oil change

Just did DSG oil change earlier. You can fill from the top via the oil filter housing in 15 minutes if the oil is warm enough. Just buy the 4-5 dollar funnel with the hose at walmart, it has the perfect size tip that fits perfectly. I'm not the first to do this, so don't let anyone tell you that the filling from the bottom is faster or better. Why waste time and money making a tool when you can buy a cheap funnel and fill from the top! Did not have to remove battery either. the only thing that was inconvenient was finding the right size hex socket for the drain plug and having to wait forever for the transmission to cool after draining.

narongc73 said:

if the oil is warm enough

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If it's not warm, then could this be catastrophic? Or, put another way, define what you mean by "warm".

ZiggyTheHamster said:

If it's not warm, then could this be catastrophic? Or, put another way, define what you mean by "warm".

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I meant before pouring the oil in make sure it's not cold, warm fluid flows better.
Sure you can pour cold oil in, it'll just take a long time to fill.

Does anyone know why the Bentley manual says to use a VAG tool to monitor the temperature of the transmission??

I just reached 40K in my 2009 JSW and want to change the fluid, but don't want to buy a scan tool. Why can't we just drain the fluid, fill through the filter, and be done??

The manual says to bring the fluid up to temperature, allowing expansion, then open the drain to allow excess fluid to drain out, the sleeve in the port will hold the correct level. Some have just driven around to get the temperature up and drained the excess without the vag-com, both methods work. There is no dipstick to check level.

It probably isn't that critical but it is advisable to get it to temperature. Like I said before an infrared temp gun will work.

Look, if you drive the car around you'll be past the temp in about 300 yards.

starting it would bring it up in about 2 minutes.

That said I top fill all the time. I find that the heat and drain method always makes it a 1/2-2/3 qt low. I've done about 150 DSG services and I can tell you they drop 4.5 quarts of oil every time from the factory. Measuring all heat and drain oil caught and what came out of the bottle ends up the above amount low every time. EVERY TIME.

I have DSG client in the 260K mile range and I have Done it this way every time without issue.

Oh, 15min? NOT A CHANCE. I heat the oil and it's still 45 min.

jasonTDI said:

Look, if you drive the car around you'll be past the temp in about 300 yards.

starting it would bring it up in about 2 minutes.

That said I top fill all the time. I find that the heat and drain method always makes it a 1/2-2/3 qt low. I've done about 150 DSG services and I can tell you they drop 4.5 quarts of oil every time from the factory. Measuring all heat and drain oil caught and what came out of the bottle ends up the above amount low every time. EVERY TIME.

I have DSG client in the 260K mile range and I have Done it this way every time without issue.

Oh, 15min? NOT A CHANCE. I heat the oil and it's still 45 min.

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I guess I'm slow this morning. but I'll ask anyway.

If you "heat and drain" you end up with < 4 quarts? Then what? You go ahead and let it cool and add the missing 1/2-2/3 quart?

You are recommending to NOT do the "heat and drain" method, but just drain, and pour in 4.5 quarts (pre-warmed oil)?

150 changes sounds like plenty of experience to me.

The baffle is supposed to regulate the oil level. If I fill the dsg and with the baffle in the oil stops coming out, that's supposed to be full. (Interested as I'm doing my DSG service on Wednesday..)

Does the factory perhaps over fill?

jasonTDI said:

I've done about 150 DSG services and I can tell you they drop 4.5 quarts of oil every time from the factory.

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Best thread I've read on here to date. Thanks Jason. This saves a lot of hassle. New filter, drain it, 4.5 quarts from the top, and go. No fill tool, homemade or otherwise, no VAG-COM, no leveling the car on jack stands.

Now I have only done about 6 but every one I have done takes between 5 and 5.5. Maybe it's just me. I do agree it takes a good 45 minutes to top fill it.

IFRCFI said:

Best thread I've read on here to date. Thanks Jason. This saves a lot of hassle. New filter, drain it, 4.5 quarts from the top, and go. No fill tool, homemade or otherwise, no VAG-COM, no leveling the car on jack stands.

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Quarts or liters?

The DSG fluid comes in liters. If you pour in 4.5L, you poured in 4.75qt. If you pour in 4.5qt, you pour in 4.25L.

I bet it's 4.5L.

IFRCFI said:

Best thread I've read on here to date. Thanks Jason. This saves a lot of hassle. New filter, drain it, 4.5 quarts from the top, and go. No fill tool, homemade or otherwise, no VAG-COM, no leveling the car on jack stands.

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x2 I have about 7,000 miles before my DSG oil change and really didn't want to start fabricating a tool for a job which will get done so rarely. Thanks Jason. If its good enough for you its certainly good enough for me. Though I think I will stick 5 litres in and just to be safe check the level since I have VCDS.

Is overfilling going to create a problem?

tdiatlast said:

Is overfilling going to create a problem?

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If it wasn't a problem they wouldn't make the process such a PITA. Although do you really want to find out?

tdiatlast said:

I guess I'm slow this morning. but I'll ask anyway.

If you "heat and drain" you end up with < 4 quarts? Then what? You go ahead and let it cool and add the missing 1/2-2/3 quart?

You are recommending to NOT do the "heat and drain" method, but just drain, and pour in 4.5 quarts (pre-warmed oil)?

150 changes sounds like plenty of experience to me.

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Don't heat and drain, just measure what you pull and add a bit for the filter loss.

dzcad90 said:

The baffle is supposed to regulate the oil level. If I fill the dsg and with the baffle in the oil stops coming out, that's supposed to be full. (Interested as I'm doing my DSG service on Wednesday..)

Does the factory perhaps over fill?

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No, I think the baffle is a bit low. The cars shift a lot better when the miles get up near the next change if you have it FULL.

hevster1 said:

Now I have only done about 6 but every one I have done takes between 5 and 5.5. Maybe it's just me. I do agree it takes a good 45 minutes to top fill it.

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The amount out depends on the temp and how long you leave it sit. I find in the summer possibly you can get close to 5 but I've never got more.

Sitting 2 hours might get you a couple ounces more.

ZiggyTheHamster said:

Quarts or liters?

The DSG fluid comes in liters. If you pour in 4.5L, you poured in 4.75qt. If you pour in 4.5qt, you pour in 4.25L.

I bet it's 4.5L.

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You are correct. I should have said 4.5 bottles.

narongc73 said:

If it wasn't a problem they wouldn't make the process such a PITA. Although do you really want to find out?

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Too full isn't good. That extra .5L could make a difference like a crank shaft would in an engine with too much oil.

That's why you MEASURE.

Jason, now you have me thinking. Draining is usually done hot, and filling is done as the trans is in its cooling state, still pretty hot (unless it had been sitting for sometime). Oil at room or ambient temp, are you suggesting pre-warming the oil if the trans is cold? The last DSG service I did took about 2 hrs (with a fan blowing in the engine compartment, granted the owner drove an hour and a half to get to my place in 95* degree heat) to cool enough before we set the fluid level. While I have not checked to see what the exact amount of oil that drained out was, but I will the next time, I dont believe it was more than a 1/2 to 3/4 of a liter. Completed as per Bentley specs. Next time I will measure the amount of oil that is drained out and use that as a reference to see what we add and what spills over. Looks like Im going to go buy a new drain pan to catch the spill over (just in case). I didnt give it much though the first time I did this serve (which was on my car, and acts as it should and will be done again in 10K miles) but I think your on to something. I will post my findings probably Wednesday.

D-Cell_Mekanick said:

The last DSG service I did took about 2 hrs (with a fan blowing in the engine compartment, granted the owner drove an hour and a half to get to my place in 95* degree heat) to cool enough before we set the fluid level. While I have not checked to see what the exact amount of oil that drained out was, but I will the next time, I dont believe it was more than a 1/2 to 3/4 of a liter.

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When I did mine with Ray_G, it was pretty hot outside and I drove about an hour to get to his house. After I drained and refilled it (with bottles that were in my trunk - not prewarmed or anything), the DSG temp was spot-on after a few seconds, and when we pulled the hose to let it drain, probably 0.5L came out. So in other words, I have the same experience as you.

Ok just finished up a DSG service. I measured what came out and then measured what spilled over. My measurements are not 100% accurate but are good enough for me. We measured ~4.5 liters out and ~4.5 liters in. I certainitly do not see the filter holding .25 of a ltr. maybe .125 at best. I guess next time I will have to measure the weight of a new filter and the used one to see what the volume of oil the filter will actually hold. There was a bit of oil left in the filter housing and some that drained back form the cooler, used the mightyvac to remove that. So all in all I'm happy to report back that we replaced all the fluid that was removed. (And before anyone decides to say I didn't, please conduct your own experiment before you pick mine apart, albeit as unscientific as it was. Used the empty bottles to measure).

Ok.. So the service in D-Cell Mekanick's post was the service on my 09 Jetta. Along with those findings, is there any reason to buy 6 litres of the fluid vs. 5 next time?

Not that $15 every 40K is a whole lot, but literally we drained about $25 worth of fluid out of the DSG. 6L in, 1.5 dropped.

I agree why buy 6 liters. I won't on my next DSG service.

I did my DSG service a couple of months ago and drained exacty 4.5 liters out + whatever is in the filter (100 ml maybe), added 4.7 liters via top fill, and about 100ml came back out when I checked the level. I now have 1 unopened bottle of fluid for the next change.

IIRC, the dry fill capacity of the DSG is around 6.4 liters. So, about 1.8 liters remains in the DSG. So the question is why are vendors selling DSG kits that contain 6 liters when only 5 is required????

Tool For DSG Service?

I know this is somewhat off the topic but has anyone used this type of tool for servicing the DSG transmission?

http://www.toolsource.com/vwaudi-dr...105582.html?osCsid=ijvmvdhu51qidama6sa85j4ou7


It is a bit pricer than the VW tool (which is around $200) but it looks like you have more versatility.

Use a $5 funnel you can get at Walmart and fill from the top. There's no need for a special filler tube / pump / adapter or whatever especially for $200 or even building a filler adapter as some have done.

It's been well documented that about 4.5 liters drains out. Just add a little more than 4.5 liters (say 4.6 / 4.7 liters) and be done with it. Next time I doubt I'll even bother checking the fluid level using VCDS to monitor temperature.

To OP: after reading what you did, i'm planning to do it myself soon.
any online vendor for oem atf recommended? thanks

TDICrazier said:

To OP: after reading what you did, i'm planning to do it myself soon.
any online vendor for oem atf recommended? thanks

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ECSTuning

thanks. is pentosin OEM?

http://www.ecstuning.com/Volkswagen-Jetta_V--TDI/Maintenance/Transmission/ES11968/