Great pictures!

If wear on the hub (pipe sticking up) is not uniform all the way around, might be an alignment issue or hub not centered on torque converter due to manufacturing error.

The second mechanic should see this and have taken any steps required to solve the issue.

Watery fluid is in thin fluid?

Might change all trans fluid in 40K miles. Cheap insurance.

Even though this problem should not have happened, the repair cost was OK. Most trans shops would have insisted on another rebuild or exchange to make extra profit.

Thanks for posting back with the photos and repairs.

Thank you, Umdaman for posting great pics of the worn out parts. This thread has been really informative and I'm glad you're back on the road!

I hope that it was just the MFG of torque converter and not something else wrong that is going to wear out my new one. In regards to the fluid, he said it seemed thin. So he changed out the fluid. But I will change fluid again around 40k, I think that is the normal time to change fluid if I'm not mistaken... I know a lot of people completely forget about their fluid in the transmission also gets worn out.......


I'm guessing the 2nd mechanic would make sure everything is aligned on this one. Good thing this 2nd guy is a brother-in-law of guy my dad knows very well. So that is a reason why I was not charged thousands. But yes I'm sure others would just say you need a new transmission. Just like the last mechanic that estimated $950 to fix my wife's Oil pump cover seal. They had in the quote for a NEW OIL PUMP also added in new water pump even though it was changed about 20k miles ago from previous owner... Yea umm ok. So I just changed the Oil pump cover gasket for like $8 or something like that. It's a 2000 but pretty much same engine so after doing my timing belt work this was a piece of cake job for me. After finding this leak I then knew that mine has the same leak because it has never been changed! So I did mine right after that one hers was major leak too mine was just slow leak.


Your welcome for the photo's. Hopefully someone else will find this thread useful if they ever have similar problems.


It sure is embarrassing when you have to have a Toyota towed away.. LOL.
I almost have 197,000 Miles on this bad dog . I'm hoping for another 100k!

Just wanted to add. I asked the guy who rebuilt my transmission, if he had an idea of what could have caused this. This was his response:

When the torque converter was installed the attaching bolts were not tightened in increments going around the diameter of the torque converter, rather the first bolt was tightened, then the next bolt was tightened, and so on. What happens is that when the trans is installed the weight of the torque converter is being supported by the pump bushing. If the torque converter isn’t rotated a couple of times, and then wiggled back-and-forth once all bolts are in place while the bolts are being incrementally tightened, the torque converter becomes joined to the flywheel in the undesirable posture. Lucky the flywheel didn’t crack.
Replacing the torque converter in addition to the bushing/seal is certainly the highest quality repair.

When I install a trans and use my technique I have noticed that upon later disassembly that the torque converter hub barely touches the bushing. Rather acts as a guide, not a support.

Sounds like that makes sense. I tend to do that circular tighten a little bit and then move onto the next bolt and slowly work my way around thing in any application that it can be done.

Thanks for posting with this information.