While
I was driving on my way home the day before yesterday, I felt my
car's automatic transmission was slipping. It couldn't shift to high
gear. Not matter how hard I depressed the accelerator pedal(the RPM
way up accordingly), the gear wouldn't shift like it should. “ Oh
my god, my tranny is gone... my tranny is gone...” I murmured to
myself. It's scary. Fortunately there was no car behind me at
that moment. I stopped at a gas station on the road side and called
a repair shop that I know to realize what happened to my car.

“ when
was the last time you serviced your transmission?” a
technician named Jeff asked.

“ I
can't remember, but I think it was long time ago.”

“OK,
now pop up the hood and check the transmission fluid, if the fluid
smells burned or looks very dark, then your automatic transmission
could be in big trouble.” Jeff replied.

I followed his instructions, pulling out the dipstick to take a close look at it.

“ It
smells not good but It doesn't smell burned.”

“ Does
the transmission fluid look pinkish?”

“ Not
really, but it's not very dark.”

“ All
right, now drive slowly on the right lane to my shop. I will see
what happened.”

It's about 5 miles from the gas station to his shop but it
took me almost 40 minutes to get there.

“ You
know what? Most motor vehicle drivers know they have to change the
engine oil regularly but not many of them realize they have to do
that to their automatic transmission fluid as well. If they drive
their car in short distance constantly, then they need to do that
even more frequently in order to keep the fluid more effective to
lubricate the transmission. You know your transmission must be
working in a safe and constant operating temperature. The fluid, I
mean clean fluid,not dirty fluid, is exactly what your tranny needs
to help cool and lubricate the moving parts. ” Jeff,a big
guy standing at least 6'4”, went on to say “ at 45,000
miles, your car is not supposed to have transmission issue.” 
He continued, “ according to my experience, the most frequent
reason that causes tranny to die prematurely is that most drivers fail
to take good care of their transmission. They should change the
fluid at least every 30,000 miles and the intervals should be even
shortened to 15,000 to 20,000 miles if they constantly drive their
car in short distance.”

“ so
what exactly made my tranny break down? ”

“ I
bet it's because of the fluid. You said you haven't changed it for a
long period of time, so the dirty fluid might have started showing
signs of contamination or overheating. The overheating fluid
could make your tranny stop working properly. so I would recommend having the transmission flushed
completely, then test drive it and see what happen, instead of just
draining and filling it, because if you don't flush, there will be
another 6 or 7 quarts of the dirty fluid remained in the torque
converter. So flushing, in my opinion, is better than changing. Do
you wanna do that? “

“ How
much does it cost? “

“ it
will cost you about a hundred and forty bucks. “

“OK,
let's give it a try.”

“ I
just test drove your car. The transmission shifts smoothly and
flawlessly right now.” Jeff called me a couple of
hours later, telling me that my car is ready to pick up.

“ now
you have clean fluid in your automatic transmission. Your tranny
should be fine for a period of time. But don't be late, when you
need to service your tranny again.”