Rear Main Seal Leak - What to do when pulling the engine?

[natenkiki2004]

Ever since I got the Ex, it always had a moist tummy from what I thought was an oil pan leak. It was never terrible, I topped it off every 1-2 months or so just because it got into the lower range but not low. It was very manageable.


I always used Valvoline MaxLife High Mileage 10W30 oil in it and it was manageable. For whatever reason, I decided to use the Walmart Supertech High Mileage 10W30 (I really can't remember why now...). This may or may not be relevant but I've not had good luck with Supertech. Seems odd that less than 600 miles after switching to cheap oil that the leak gets drastically worse.


Anyway, the last week or two, oil is actively dripping underneath when the engine is idling. I noticed the other day that it got to the point where it's a drip every 4-5 seconds. I left a pretty mean puddle when parked for 2.5 hours. Yesterday and today I crawled underneath to look around and clean things to get a better idea. It kinda looked like I was going to be lucky since the oil level sensor looked wet and everything below it did too. Sprayed and wiped a fair bit down and started the truck. Within 30 seconds to a minute, I saw drips starting to fall:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u...rer/Pictures/CameraZOOM-20140929103754336.jpg

It's definitely oil, not trans fluid (though I have that leaking elsewhere )

I'm sure I have a few things working against me. I know the pan is leaking, this looks to be the rear main seal and then I may even have the oil pressure/level sensors leaking as well. To take care of this the right way, it would probably be best to yank the engine.


Going that deep would mean a great opportunity to check/replace other things, that's what this post is about. I'm not a mechanic and don't really know what things I should be looking at. Discussing this with a friend, we came up with a list of stuff to at least check, if not replace:

- Connecting Rod Bearings
- Oil Pump & Screen
- Oil Pan gasket
- Rear Main Seal
- Torque Converter/Trans Input shaft seal
- Motor Mounts

I don't have the time or really the money to rebuild this engine from the bottom up but at the same time, I don't want to waste an opportunity to pull the engine and check things. I want to have a reliable vehicle that I can depend on. At this point, I threw in some Bars Rear Main Seal Stop Leak in hopes that it might slow down enough to buy me some time to gather knowledge and funds to do things right.

If you made it this far, thank you. Any help or ideas are appreciated.

 

[Roadrunner777]

Probably so obvious you did not mention it, but I would replace the motor mounts.

 

[natenkiki2004]

Brilliant! I wasn't even thinking about them. Added to my post, thanks.

 

[larrydd999]

I recall a thread some time ago regarding the 'distributor' assembly, located at the very rear of the engine and a real bear to work on (replacing the bearings, etc.) without pulling the engine. I did a quick search without finding it, but perhaps someone with better engine knowledge can add to this and call it by its proper name.

 

[natenkiki2004]

Larry, are you talking about the camshaft position sensor? I'm pretty sure my 1991 doesn't have one. I think I would have seen/felt it when I was messing around replacing the O2 sensor from the top. I could be wrong though.