CVT Maintenance Question

[CROSSBOLT]

This is opaque green. Perhaps it's a tinge darker against the white paper towel in certain light. Attachment 23241

This is the usual definition of the word "opaque." I know I have gone beyond irritating BUT my impression of what you are saying is the appearance should be that of extremely weak tea but with green-ish tint rather than tan. That right?

https://www.thefreedictionary.com/opaque

[Dirk Diggler]

This is the usual definition of the word "opaque." I know I have gone beyond irritating BUT my impression of what you are saying is the appearance should be that of extremely weak tea but with green-ish tint rather than tan. That right?

https://www.thefreedictionary.com/opaque

I just googled opaque and thus was the 1st image that came up so who knows lol? I'm not an interior decorator, so you could very well be right.

[Fummins]

So, my Mirage has 74,000 miles on it, and I'm 99% sure the CVT fluid has never been changed. I purchased it at 30-40,000 miles. I know now that Jatco CVTs have to be meticulously maintained or they will end themselves, and financially end their negligent owners as well. I used to own a '94 Corolla with 250k on it and was told not to change the transmission fluid in it since it had possible never been changed before. Does this apply to CVTs as well?

My question is, is 74k too many miles to change the fluid? Will I get slippage if I change it at this point? I noticed it's struggling to downshift to the equivalent of "first gear" when I'm stopping so I've been decelerating a lot more slowly since I noticed this. I have the fluid and both filters ordered from eBay and they will be here next week.

I'm also new to actually knowing things about cars, so any explanations of fundamental misunderstandings I may have are certainly appreciated.

It's not gonna hurt anything to change the fluid in the cvt. Clean fluid is good. The fluid I use is light brown out of the bottle. The oem stuff is clearish with the green tinge.

I've been able to reuse the stock pan gaskets 97% of the time trouble free. When I did end up replacing the gasket it was with another oem one(cause that's all that was relatively readily available at the time).

I find these things shift differently depending on how your drive them as well as ambient air temps. In the winter mine will downshift really aggressively to the point of rarely needing to hit the brakes until almost stopped. When it's warmer out the thing will coast forever.
I've bought or seen milk in a bag. That would be a disaster in my house. We buy milk in plastic jugs or cartons over here in the part of the country, where we're most hated by the drama teacher.