What Are the Top Seven Ways to Damage Your Transmission?

2. Shift Gears Before Stopping

When you’re in a hurry, it’s easy to shift from reverse to drive (or vice versa) while your car is still moving. Most of us think that’s okay. In reality, you can cause serious damage to your gears when you don’t shift while at a complete stop. The lighter end of potential damage is added chips and cracks but when done regularly you can even explode a gear with this habit. If you explode a gear, that will have a big impact on other parts within your transmission and will end up potentially requiring a whole new transmission.

3. Towing Heavy Loads

Some cars just aren’t meant to tow heavy loads. Even if your car is built to tow, you should be mindful of the recommended weight limits and abide by them. When you force your car to tow too much extra weight, you place extra strain on your transmission, causing it to overheat. This accelerates wear and tear of parts within your transmission and can cause serious problems.

4. Forget About Your Cooling System

Don’t let your engine regularly overheat. When your engine overheats, so does your transmission because they use the same cooling system to maintain a healthy operating temperature. Avoid costly transmission repair by keeping an eye on your coolant levels and engine temperature. If you notice your coolant is low or your engine temperature tends to run a bit high, take your car in to be serviced.

This is especially true if you tend to drive in more strenuous conditions, such as in the mountains, or if you tend to carry heavy loads. Both will easily cause your engine and transmission to overheat if your cooling system isn’t up to par.

5. Drive Rough

You know that person who speeds past you on the road revving their engine. If that’s you, be aware you may be damaging your transmission. Hard acceleration and shifting gears at high RPMs will wreak havoc on your transmission. Over time, you’re going to end up spending a lot of extra money on transmission repair services.

6. Skip Regular Transmission Services

Keeping up with regular transmission maintenance will keep expensive transmission repairs at bay. It is recommended that you get a transmission fluid change or flush every 30,000-60,000 miles, though this varies depending on your car and how you drive. Over time, even with normal driving, your transmission fluid becomes dirty and contaminated, both from the environment and normal wear and tear of metal parts.

Whether or not you notice problems with how your transmission handles, bringing your car to a transmission expert regularly will ensure any problems are caught early on. The longer it takes to get an issue diagnosed, the worse it can be.

7. Ignore a Small Transmission Problem

If you are noticing a problem with your transmission, even if you think it’s small, you should take it to a repair shop to get diagnosed as soon as possible. Transmission repairs can quickly escalate when not addressed and you want to avoid causing more damage than necessary. If your transmission fluid is low, it’s a simple repair. If that transmission repair is ignored for a period of time, it will cause serious damage to your transmission.