Leaking rear main seal

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ozzyleven

New member
So, the rear main seal has officially taken a turn for the worst on my 94 3.0. Its been 'seeping' since I bought it, but today while flushing the coolant I noticed the first drips on the ground and all over the oil pan. When I bought the rig, I was quoted $900 and $1200 to fix it from two different places. Drives me crazy to think a $12 seal could cost a grand to fix.

Has anyone here done this themselves? I know the trans has to be dropped out of the way (I've never done this). How many hours of work am I looking at, and if I'm taking the time to do this, how much work would a M/T conversion add?
 
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So, yea. If you have never dropped a tranny then I strongly recommend you allow someone to do it for you. If this were your project car, I would say, go for it and get some experience. This sounds like your daily driver.

It takes tools and knowledge to do this. And yea, the 900 dollars is the labor and experience.
 
I've done loads of work on this truck. Unfortunately yes, it is my daily driver, but its also a project truck. I've been slowly but surely bringing it back to its former glory. Transmissions are one thing I've never done though. I have tools, I have some experience, and I have a small bank account, so I am more or less forced into doing it myself.
 
SUBTEGRAL said:
Dropping the transmission itself takes an experienced man about 20 minutes.
Click to expand...

I will disagree with this statement to an extent.

A M/T with a two post lift with a shop complete with all air tools I need....about a half hour

An auto trans with only a jack and stands and a creeper(maybe, I'm my case a door panel) with hand tools, not air tools and never droping an auto before....~6hours if you take no breaks at all and have a step by step guide and a second person

I know I just did one today in the woods. Their not fun and weigh a hell of a lot. And I'm an ase tech that knows what I'm doing around a car/truck

So please do not try and mislead members that's its a 20 minute job for an auto trans in the drive way.....
 
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SUBTEGRAL said:
That's what I was thinking of .. manual transmission... 20 .. 30 minutes, whatever.

And I wasn't being misleading.
Click to expand...

Roger that. ....I think the op has a auto trans, as he asked about the manual conversion at the end of his post.

Manual transmissions are much much easier then autos....sorry I can't help with the auto to manual trans swap info, as I have never done it. But am sure lots of members here have.
 
rustbucket said:
I will disagree with this statement to an extent.

A M/T with a two post lift with a shop complete with all air tools I need....about a half hour

An auto trans with only a jack and stands and a creeper(maybe, I'm my case a door panel) with hand tools, not air tools and never droping an auto before....~6hours if you take no breaks at all

I know I just did one today in the woods. Their not fun and weigh a hell of a lot. And I'm an ase tech that knows what I'm doing around a car/truck

So please do not try and mislead membership that's its a 20 minute job for an auto trans in the drive way.....
Click to expand...

:iagree:

Drive lines, wiring, cooler lines, cross member removal, bell housing bolts, torque converter bolts, and shifter plus the other crap i cant think of off the top of my head in 20 min.

As stated above, don't mislead people. Someone that is over confident could read that and think it's an easy job. Then get in over his head, and put his rig into more downtime than need be.

OP: maybe you have a slightly more inclined mechanic friend. It can be done in a weekend with some help. A day with some good help. Unfortunately rear main seals are one of the worst to replace on any vehicle. If you do decide to do it yourself, just take your time and do it right.
 
^ That would be my time estimate if everything went smooth.

I would also recommend renting a transmission jack. Places 'round here rent them for about $30 a day. Those things are HEAVY.
 
GonOvr said:
As stated above, don't mislead people. Someone that is over confident could read that and think it's an easy job. Then get in over his head, and put his rig into more downtime than need be.
Click to expand...

I was only thinking of a manual transmission, and I said for "an experienced man" ...!

I wasn't being misleading!

So ozzy, if you have a M/T, you know an "experienced shop" shouldn't charge more than 30 minutes to drop the transmission, and 30 minutes to re-install it. The rest of the labor time should only account for replacing the rear main seal. ... but if you do in fact have an automatic transmission ... the labor time is much, much longer..

.. or am I being misleading once again?
 
I've NEVER said anything about being an expert, but I was definitely right in what I said.

And also Swifty, I thought you just said you put me on "ignore mode" ... ?
 
I do have an auto in there right now and I figured it would take much more than half hour for removal. I have a M/T sitting in the garage waiting to be rebuilt, along with the T-case, clutch assembly, shifters, pedals, etc. Buddy of mine has a transmission jack I can borrow. Plan was to rebuild everything on the M/T this winter and attack the removal of the auto when its warm (if the leaking lets me wait that long). Seems like once the auto is out, switching in a M/T should be relatively simple. I'll just plan on a long weekend to do it. Everything on this rig takes twice as long as its supposed to thanks to uncooperative bolts and such, so I'd consider it a success to finish in two days.

One thing I'm unclear about is if I need a different rear drive shaft? I've read that you can do it with the original from the auto, but that the splines only seat partially. Anyone have any advice on that?
 
ozzyleven said:
Everything on this rig takes twice as long as its supposed to thanks to uncooperative bolts and such, so I'd consider it a success to finish in two days.
Click to expand...


Frozen bolts are the biggest PITA, I hate rust and completely understand.

Im no help on the drive shaft though...sorry, But was under the impression that they were the same length. Can you measure your current shaft and tell us how long it is, then some one with a manual can measure and you can compare.

And lets keep this on topic ozzys sake.
 
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SUBTEGRAL said:
I was only thinking of a manual transmission, and I said for "an experienced man" ...!

I wasn't being misleading!

So ozzy, if you have a M/T, you know an "experienced shop" shouldn't charge more than 30 minutes to drop the transmission, and 30 minutes to re-install it. The rest of the labor time should only account for replacing the rear main seal. ... but if you do in fact have an automatic transmission ... the labor time is much, much longer..

.. or am I being misleading once again?
Click to expand...

Stop just stop. You've obviously never worked in a shop of any sort, you aren't talking from experiance here unless you deal with an "eastside chop shop" where the tech(backyard mechanic with a name on his shirt) who looks at the vehicle and just throws out a labor rate/time to do the job. I'm guessing "book" time for r and r for a manual trans for our gen runners would call for ~3hours. Not including the .5hour for replacing the rear main.

The shop may get it done in an hour hour and a half but you as a customer would pay for the whole book time.....ahh the joy of flatrate work......fml lol work for a hour get paid for 3+ and get on another job while still getting paid for the time for the first job.
 
Listen dic k-head, I told him the amount of time it would actually take an experienced shop to drop and re-install a manual transmission, I said NOTHING about what any rip-off shops would quote for a labor time and price tag.
 
You Specificly said he would be "charged" 30mins for removal and 30mins for reinstall. Thats talking about money not just how much time its takes. I was educatingo you and the OP on whats would acutally be charged by a shop to do the job. Average hourly rate for a shop is 60/hr. Dealers will charage up to 80/hr.
 
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I didn't say he would be charged by the shop for that amount of time, I said he should be charged for that amount of time. .. I told the truth about the REAL time to drop and re-install a manual transmission.

Dealing with some rip-off shop about it would be a whole different matter.

As far as labor rates, general shops around here are like $70 - $100 an hour ... while the Toyota Stealership .... ? .... I shudder to think ..
 
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