First of all, many thanks to Maineman and Loudgoldwing for their suggestions and tips on changing the trans fluid/filter on my newly acquired '94 90CS.

Before the change I was getting a clunk and chirp when going from 3rd to 4th. With the new fluid and filter, both of those are gone and tranny shifts very smoothly. Very worthwhile project, especially considering that the filter that I removed had a date stamp on it of 1993! 18 years and 130,000 miles without a fluid/filter change.

Maineman mentioned removing the upper dipstick tube bolt to aid in re-installation of the tube into the pan, I would add to that to go ahead and also remove the one that is about halfway down the tube that hold it to the block. This way the tube was completely loose to insure that the pan nut was not cross-threaded.

Since I have been driving her a bit more now, another question has arisen. The temperature gauge only moves between the first three bars right above the "C" even when the engine is warmed up. The cooling fans seem to kick on when necessary, like when it was sitting idling in the driveway after being driven. I would guess that the resistance from the sending unit is on the fritz since I am still getting some movement, but clearly not a good reading. What should cold resistance be on the sending unit? Any other suggestions?

Thanks again everyone for suggestions, this has been a most helpful forum in just the month or so we have had the car.

 

The coolant temp gauge and the fuel gauge are both notoriously weak in these cars.

Mine don't work very well, either. A lot of people have offered fixes, but I can't say for sure that they work. Check around, and find out about a few.

Me? I have an OBDII port in mine, so I bought an Ultragauge and mounted it on my dash, covering the temp gauge. The Ultragauge gives me estimated fuel level through economy calculation. It gives me real-time coolant temperature, too. I consistently hover between 197.6 and 204.4 in normal driving conditions, so I know it's working properly.

(edit) Do yourself a HUGE favor and buy two things:

1) a Mity-Vac. It's basically a bicycle-pump with a 2-gallon clear cylinder tank and thin hose attached to it. It runs about $70.

2) Two gallons' worth of Valvoline Max-Life brand ATF. It's what I use.

Pull out your transmission dipstick, and measure the EXACT distance from the highest indented "fill-spot" to the inner lip of the red handle. Mark that EXACT lenth on the hose of the Mity-Vac. That will tell you EXACTLY how deep the hose of the Mity-Vac needs to reach in order to ensure the EXACT amount of tranny fluid is in your pan.

Every 2 or 3 days of driving (at least 50 miles should do the trick), pull two quarts of fluid out through the dipstick (the Mity-Vac tank has measurements on it), and put 2 new quarts in through the dipstick. With 2 gallons of the tranny fluid, you can obviously do this 4 times.

By doing this second set of periodic and partial swaps, you're ridding the tranny of all of the gunk that is currently being busted loose by the FRESH detergents in your recently replaced fluid. If you don't do this, you run the risk of having the same issues you were having pop up again within the next 5,000 miles. You have 130,000 miles' worth of accumulated crap to clean out.

 

I seem to be afflicted by both of those issued. Fuel gauge is intermittent, but I found a write up on that repair. Looking for same for the temp gauge.

Thanks for mentioning the Ultragauge. Googled it and bought one for my Scion.

 

Don't forget to do a search (available on the drop-down menu above; under "Search") here. Using "MFTS" as a search term yielded 105 references, of which this is but one to get you started:

https://www.audiworld.com/forums/sho...highlight=mfts

 

Thanks Lago, using the MFTS keyword really helped, although I did have to Google MFTS first to find out what it meant.

And to Loudwoldwing, roger wilco on the Mity-Vac method. I am gonna try to do that all in one day. Go for a 40-50 mile ride, pump, fill, repeat. The car is not a daily driver, so I have the fortune to have it sit until I can get to it. I know that I don't want to have to change the filter anytime soon, again, so the fluid flushing sounds like an excellent idea.

Many thanks again!