Rear Main Seal Help!

[dinorl007]

when i removed my oil pan on a stock xj with 215 tires, i had to remove the nuts on top of the shocks and the sway bar links, this allo wed the axle to drop enough to get the pan out and BACK IN,

 

[ebjones7]

I had to disconnect my front shocks and remove the oil pump inside the oil pan before I could get it out. But I did! I now have it all out and am ready to put the new seal in but everything I read says to put the lips towards the bulk of the engine.

I am not sure what they mean by the lip? I noticed that the seal has an little angle to in on the inner part of it. I put it in the block with that angle-slant facing the bulk of the engine. I am not sure if this is right or not but please let me know which way to put it in.

I only want to do this once.

Thanks A lot

 

[5-90]

I had to disconnect my front shocks and remove the oil pump inside the oil pan before I could get it out. But I did! I now have it all out and am ready to put the new seal in but everything I read says to put the lips towards the bulk of the engine.

I am not sure what they mean by the lip? I noticed that the seal has an little angle to in on the inner part of it. I put it in the block with that angle-slant facing the bulk of the engine. I am not sure if this is right or not but please let me know which way to put it in.

I only want to do this once.

Thanks A lot

The rear main (and front main, for that matter...) is a "wiper" type seal, and definitely needs to go on the right way. Sounds like you need to turn it around.

If you look at the end of the thing, you'll see a sort of Vee shape where the lip of the seal separates from the body - kinda like a lopsided letter "V" in fact.

The open side of that V needs to point toward the inside of the engine. If you have the point/closed side in there, you will leak oil from the rear main almost immediately (and it won't be the fault of the seal!) Sorry I don't have a pic to hand...

Awright - a few seconds with alltheweb.com produced this - it should help:

This is a vacuum seal, and actually has a two-way effect - so think that you're working with only half of it.

See how there's a definite separation between the sealing lip and the body of the seal? That's the "open side" that I'm talking about (it's to either side of the seal,) and it's that opening that needs to be pointed inwards toward the engine. That's how it "wipes" oil off of the shaft - if you turn it the other way, it won't wipe and you'll have a leak again. Make sense?

 

[Stockton]

Be sure to rotate your crankshaft prior to installing your new rms. I made the mistake of not doing this, resulting in me replacing my rms twice in a week! This is not something that you want to do over again right after you finish it the first time! I had a burr on my crankshaft that chewed apart my rms and was in the upper part of the rear main bearing housing when I initially did the rms. Just take your time and congrats in getting past the oil pan (the hardest part of the job!).

 

[sw4218]

I removed the top shock nuts and jacked the axle down and I was able to get the pan out and in without removing the oil pump.

 

[Markos]

The suspension lift gives more clearance between the chassis and the axles. The engine is mounted to the chassis, not the axle. Therefore, having a suspension lift will give you more room to remove the sump.

I know what you are saying, but my response is out of context without the quote from my original reply. He said that with a stock suspension, you may need to lift the engine. It makes no sense since you can easily create a 'lifted' suspension by dropping the axle. Maybe you need taller jackstands to get the chassis up higher before dropping the axle, maybe not. Believe it or not, I know that the engine isn't mounted to the axle.

Stock track bar and control arms only drop so far. Try it on a stock set up, then it will make perfect sense.

Several people have already mentioned a sucessful RMS job on stockers with dropped axles. If the trackbar is a problem, that's one extra bolt on the axle. I always unbolt my trackbar when doing suspension work. You can unhook the trackbar, swaybar links, and shock mounts in a few minutes. Certainly easier than lifting the engine.

 

[5-90]

I know what you are saying, but my response is out of context without the quote from my original reply. He said that with a stock suspension, you may need to lift the engine. It makes no sense since you can easily create a 'lifted' suspension by dropping the axle. Maybe you need taller jackstands to get the chassis up higher before dropping the axle, maybe not. Believe it or not, I know that the engine isn't mounted to the axle.

My apologies - but I wanted to make sure we were all clear (the funny thing is that some vehicles damn sure do have the engine as part of the front suspension! I've seen a few Euro imports like that...)

But you don't need to lift the engine, as you said. Jack up the front to "full droop" (leave a little daylight between the tyres and the ground,) and lift up the arse end of the transmission if necessary. Problem solved.

 

[ebjones7]

GOT IT!!!

So I finally got the RMS adventure all figured out and it doesn't seem to be leaking. I ended up disconnecting the shocks, trackbar, and disconnecting the sway bar. I also had to remove the oil pump which was no big deal.

Now on to my next problem. I am ran the engine for like 15 minutes after I fixed the RMS and everything seemed to be just fine. Oh ya I switched over to synthetic oil b/c I figured I was getting close to 100k miles and it was about time to just work out all the little leaks. So after running the engine there were no leaks. I took a different car to class and came back 3 hours later and noticed there were two different spots of oil under my XJ. I noticed the oil was running down the passenger side of the block down onto the starter. I have read a million threads about the valve cover and oil filter housing leaking. I believe that mine is that valve cover b/c a line of oil runs all the way down from the rear passenger side of the block. I will probably just replace the valve cover gasket tomorrow and see if that solves the problem.

Thanks for everyones help again!

Elliott