zogg
Member
- Joined
- October 3, 2009
- Messages
- 28
- Reaction score
- 0
- City, State
- Bethalto, IL
- Year, Model & Trim Level
- 1997 Explorer Sport
:roll:Modesty aside, I am a pretty good mechanic. So, I thought it would be a good idea to change the tranny fuild and filter in my "new" 97 Explorer.
I loosen the bolts, drain most of the fluid, take out all the bolts, and the dammm pan will not come out of the truck. For over an hour, I tried to move it in every direction, and bent a vent pipe out of the way for clearance....I could not believe I was having all of this trouble.
So, I grabed my new Haines manual and it sid to unbolt the pan and drop it....well, crap, it won't come out.
It looks like I need to remove the rear transmission cross member....I only need about 3/4 of an inch clearance....I could not believe it!!
So, I would up sliding the pan as far as I could to the drivers side, and tilted it upward....it gave just barely enough room to get a wrench on the filter bolt, so I was able to change the filter. Fortunately, it had a rubber gasket on the pan, which came right off so I crammed the new gasket onto the pan and held it in plase with a couple of bolts until I got it back on. I was able to reach the magnet and wipe out the gunk in the pan....looks like it had been changed before.
So, a 45 minute job took about two and one half hours all over about 3/4 inch of lacknog clearance....
Am I just plain stupid, or is there something else I was supposed to do????
Fortunately, everything went back together ok, with no leaks and the tranny shifts perfectly.
What am I missing??? This can't be the design of a sane Ford engineer....ugh!!!:roll::roll::roll:
I loosen the bolts, drain most of the fluid, take out all the bolts, and the dammm pan will not come out of the truck. For over an hour, I tried to move it in every direction, and bent a vent pipe out of the way for clearance....I could not believe I was having all of this trouble.
So, I grabed my new Haines manual and it sid to unbolt the pan and drop it....well, crap, it won't come out.
It looks like I need to remove the rear transmission cross member....I only need about 3/4 of an inch clearance....I could not believe it!!
So, I would up sliding the pan as far as I could to the drivers side, and tilted it upward....it gave just barely enough room to get a wrench on the filter bolt, so I was able to change the filter. Fortunately, it had a rubber gasket on the pan, which came right off so I crammed the new gasket onto the pan and held it in plase with a couple of bolts until I got it back on. I was able to reach the magnet and wipe out the gunk in the pan....looks like it had been changed before.
So, a 45 minute job took about two and one half hours all over about 3/4 inch of lacknog clearance....
Am I just plain stupid, or is there something else I was supposed to do????
Fortunately, everything went back together ok, with no leaks and the tranny shifts perfectly.
What am I missing??? This can't be the design of a sane Ford engineer....ugh!!!:roll::roll::roll: