hey guys, I tried posting in the help forum and it wont let me so here I go. I have a 98 sport 4.0 SOHC auto tranny, with AWD/4x4, witchever you want to call it. 140thousand miles on her and now shes starting to come apart. I was on the way home from the paintball feild and noticed smoked and right away stopped and sheck guages and killed it. guages came out fine so poped the hood and found nothing up there abnormal. looked on the underside and oil was dripping on my exhaust and making smoke. could'nt figure it out in the almost dark so I took it real easy on her on the way home. broke ot the jack and checked her out today and ther is a paper gasket between the engine and tranny that is leaking oil. so I checked my oil and it fine, then my atf and its low, took a closer look and smelled and it is atf coming out between the tranny and engine. So thats not the rear main engine seal, what is it I guess is my question and is it a common thing on my year with that may miles, sorry to drag it out. please help, richard until its fixed im stranded

If I was guessing, I'd guess it's either a tranmission shaft seal leak or a torque converter leak. Either way, something's taken a dump and may have toasted the tranny. Find a good transmission shop in the area and see if they'll tow it in (or if you have AAA, let them do it). I personally wouldn't suggest driving it at all unless absolutely necessary, and only then once you've topped off the fluid and only when absolutely necessary.

-Joe

his tranny isnt toasted yet, he just doesnt want to toast it.

Personally, i dont know anything about your year explorer. with 140k miles on the truck, nothing is out of the ordinary. Do some reasearch on what seals are back there, and i would say 'dig deep' and replace all of them. I would imagin this wouldnt be an extremely hard job for the at home mechanic. You dont have to rebuild anything, just drop the tranny and put new seals on it. if you have never done this, and you have 5 straight days off from work, then you can do this. otherwise i would imagin it costing $1200+ to get this kind of work done somewhere.

Sounds like the front pump seal ont he transmission let go, trans must come out to fix it and if you are gonna pull the trans mine as well rebuild or replace :)

anyone got anything else, before I look into it any deeper?

ok, do you know a place to go to to find rebuild kits and has anyone had good luck with rebuilds, at one time I was to the understanding it was a "throw away tranny" that it was better to get a new one

I'm with my friend 410Fortune. Sounds like a front pump seal failure...and at 140K if *I* had it out or any reason I'd rebuild it.

ok, thanks, sounds like time to search for a rebuild kit, anyone got any ideas?

You going to rebuild the auto yourself?

do you see where the paper gasket let go? or are you assuming it let go because thats where the fluids are... one of my tranny cooler lines was rotted out and thre w fluid over the exhaust and pretty much made a good mess. not trying to say that the seals not bad, cuz I'm not there..... but a little hole under pressure can squirt a long way...