CptObvious

Looking for a how-to on changing tranny fluid and front/center/rear diff fluid.
Are the front diff, center diff, and rear diff all different drain & fill areas or are any of them shared, if shared...which are shared?
What are the fill capacities, fill to the top?
Havent found much online for the a4 b6 v6 quattro (2002)
Thanks

lyleswk

Manual or Automatic or CVT?

On the manual, the tranny and torsen share fluid drain and fill locations. The rear diff is separate and uses a different oil. See below for a link

AudiWorld Tech Articles

Auto should be similar although the fluid is different and there is a filter / screen.

CptObvious

Manual.
do i need any special socket(s)? E.g. the 16mm triple square that the VW MKIV requires for any of the drain or fill bolts?
Thanks

lyleswk

Since manual, just follow the instructions in the link; it is very easy. And yes, you will need a special tool for the drain plug on the tranny / Torsen; can't remember where I bought mine.

Also, I would personally recommend you go to the dealer and Audi oils. I do that since I was bit by aftermarket fluid recommendation on another car. But, if you ask 5 people on the forums, you will get 6 or 7 opinions. I trust the manufacturer of the car since they did all their testing with their fluid.

CptObvious

In the article it appears the front differential/tranny has a bottom drain bolt. In other online articles about this, there is only one plug and the fluid has to get sucked out.
If the latter, what tool can be used to suck out the fluid, recommendations?

Highmile

On my '03 3.0 6spd the drain and fill plugs for the transmission use no special tools. It's #8 Allen I believe. The drain plug is on the bottom and the fill plug is near where the drivers side CV axle attaches to the transmission.

There is a second drain plug, but I believe they share the same fill plug. Someone please confirm?

To pump the fluid in, I took the pump out of a hand soap dispenser and plug a short length of tube on either end. Its slow, but effective.

lyleswk

Couple points noting I followed the link exactly and did not have issues. Also, I did this on an 02 and 03 with the 5 speed, so don't know if there are any differences with the 6 speed.

1) I did not look closely for a second drain, so I can't answer that question. And, the drain on the tranny / Torsen was the special torx tool on mine, not a common 8 mm allen.
2) Apparently one of the links you looked at opted to only pull the fill plug and not the drain plug and suck the old fluid out. I am not a fan of this because I believe there is more residual fluid that is not replaced and doesn't save time. The only thing it saves is purchasing the special torx tool.
3) On the tranny / torsen, I used a long piece of tube and filled to overflow from the engine compartment. Not sure this will work on the 3.0 based on fit of the engine, but on the 1.8, you can see the fill plug looking down from the engine compartment.
4) On the rear diff, you will have to use a pump. No space to let gravity be your friend.

CptObvious

I did both the rear diff and the tranny/front diff over the weekend.
On mine (2002 A4 B6 3.0L NA V6 quattro) there is both a drain plug on the bottom as well as a fill plug on the side for both the rear diff as well as the tranny/front diff (total 4 bolts). All four of the bolts in my case used a 10mm allen head.
I replaced 3* out of 4 with an ECS hex head bolt.
* the ecs front diff svc kit comes with only one bolt while the rear came with both.
The filling part is easily done with a cheap tube pump and a short fat empty container (in my case the tube that extends into the container isn't long enuf to reach to the bottom of the container that the gear oil comes in) and a buddy to do the pumping while u hold the tip in the fill hole