Rear Oil Seal.

[victor]

My rear main oil seal is leaking. i have most of the motor apart (top end) and i was wondering if there was any way of changing the seal without an engine lift??

[Toysrme]

Nope, never heard of it. Either get the car on a lift and drop the tranny, or pull the motor out. :\ It's nearly impossible to change the last rear spark plug let alone the RMS.

One of our local dealers quoted me 9 months ago $450 free parts labor only; another $725.
It was part of some special at the same time with one of the major tune-ups. I wish I woulda done it :'(

[victor]

guess i'm dropping the tranny then.

[Toysrme]

Good luck =) Wanna do mine too???

[victor]

we'll see. is yours leaking??? mine is kinda of like a slow pour of oil. there's no way i can even drive the car.

my camry has been sitting for maybe 4 years, without being driven. when i finally wanted to give it a go, i guess the seals dried out (the cars been sitting in the sun.)

[profuse007]

just did a post about it and finish a job upon it, maybe a month ago.

just rent a engine hoist or lift, if you dont have one, at ur local tool rental place (not at HDepot). search on yellow page if you need to.

you cant drop the tranny, period!!!!

[victor]

i only hacve a maxima, how am i gonna get the hoist to my house?? is the hoist collapsable??

[REAPER STRAIN]

I’m changing my rear main seal retainer gasket this weekend. I did it last weekend but it leaked more after we were finished. I think we didn’t add enough gasket maker to the paper gasket that came with the oil seal (Napa). That and/or we didn’t take the oil pan off at the same time we the took the retainer off (the bottom of the retainer makes up one side of where the oil pan bolts up).

I wanted to know if anyone has changed the retainer seal and what tips you may have for me. Usually people just change that main seal because the retainer doesn’t leak.
I will be sure to add more than enough gasket maker as described in the autozone's illustration: http://autozone.com/servlet/UiBroker...3d8013e79f.jsp

I am also going to the dealer to buy the metal gasket for the retainer. This was the original gasket that came with the car.
I also noticed that I am missing 1 bolt (out of 6) that attaches the flywheel to the crankshaft. Could this be a cause of an oil leak? I read somewhere that if the surface where the crankshaft and the flywheel makes contact is scratched there will be a permanent oil leak. That was for a 300Z but it raised my interests. I still can’t see how oil will come from anywhere near that bolt but its just a question.



Thanks in advance
GEN3 - 5SFE

[skewe]

i paid like $320 for the rear main seal done.
it did help cos the oil will drip onto the exhause and it would seem that my gen3 was smoking badly..

mine was a local mom/pops shop, so it might be cheaper. It was a day's job 4 them.

[500KCamry]

Geeze it'd be nice if you could push the two apart by four/five inches while still in the car.