I recently noticed that I had an oil leak coming from the front of my motor. After cleaning up the front of the motor to determine where the leak was coming from it was easy to see that it was coming from where the oil pump cover mated to the timing chain cover. I crawled under the truck once running and oil was coming out in a slow but steady stream from the area shown in the attached picture below.
After reading several posts on what others have done when they have had a bad oil pump seal I was concerned that I would end up having to pull the timing chain cover to get the philips head bolts off that hold the oil pump cover on. I went ahead and took a gamble and decided I would try and pull the oil pump cover off without removing the timing chain cover as well as the Radiator. I spent quite a bit of time thinking about how I would do this to keep from stripping out the heads as they are very soft and tend to strip out easily as others have said. For those of you that need to replace or may someday need to replace this seal I have documented a successful method of removing the oil pump cover in place, on the motor, that I have found made this a very easy task.
There is no way you can do this with a standard screwdriver as there is not enough room with the radiator in place, as well as you can not get enough leverage to turn the bolts. What you will need to purchase is a short #3 philips head bit that will fit on a 1/4 inch socket. This will allow you to get the leverage you need using a ratchet. I purchased several different short #3 philips head bits from different stores to find the one that had the tightest fit. The one that had the best fit was from Harbor Freight. See attached picture of needed philips head. I purchased two just in case.
These are the steps I took to complete this job:
Step One: Remove all belts as well as the fan clutch. To remove fan and clutch take top two bolts off of fan shroud that attach it to the top of the radiator. Once you have all four bolts pulled that hold the fan clutch on, pull the fan and clutch out between the shroud and radiator being careful not damage your radiator.
Step Two: Remove steering stabilizer and small front splash shield.
Step Three: I drained motor oil as I replaced the front crank shaft seal. (don’t know if I needed to do this, but I didnt want any surprises while doing the job)
Step Four: Remove crank shaft pulley. Use ¾ inch 30mm socket w/ breaker bar placed under passenger side of frame. Disconnect distributor lead. Then bump the starter and the bolt will break loose.
Step Five: Remove Idler puller (I replaced new from Toyota)
Step Six: Take your short #3 philips head bit and place it in one of the screws holding the oil pump cover in place. Tap it with a small hammer for about 30 seconds. Be careful not to accidentally hit your radiator. I found that this does two things. It seats the philips bit into the head and shocks the bolt helping loosen things up.
continued on next post...
After reading several posts on what others have done when they have had a bad oil pump seal I was concerned that I would end up having to pull the timing chain cover to get the philips head bolts off that hold the oil pump cover on. I went ahead and took a gamble and decided I would try and pull the oil pump cover off without removing the timing chain cover as well as the Radiator. I spent quite a bit of time thinking about how I would do this to keep from stripping out the heads as they are very soft and tend to strip out easily as others have said. For those of you that need to replace or may someday need to replace this seal I have documented a successful method of removing the oil pump cover in place, on the motor, that I have found made this a very easy task.
There is no way you can do this with a standard screwdriver as there is not enough room with the radiator in place, as well as you can not get enough leverage to turn the bolts. What you will need to purchase is a short #3 philips head bit that will fit on a 1/4 inch socket. This will allow you to get the leverage you need using a ratchet. I purchased several different short #3 philips head bits from different stores to find the one that had the tightest fit. The one that had the best fit was from Harbor Freight. See attached picture of needed philips head. I purchased two just in case.
These are the steps I took to complete this job:
Step One: Remove all belts as well as the fan clutch. To remove fan and clutch take top two bolts off of fan shroud that attach it to the top of the radiator. Once you have all four bolts pulled that hold the fan clutch on, pull the fan and clutch out between the shroud and radiator being careful not damage your radiator.
Step Two: Remove steering stabilizer and small front splash shield.
Step Three: I drained motor oil as I replaced the front crank shaft seal. (don’t know if I needed to do this, but I didnt want any surprises while doing the job)
Step Four: Remove crank shaft pulley. Use ¾ inch 30mm socket w/ breaker bar placed under passenger side of frame. Disconnect distributor lead. Then bump the starter and the bolt will break loose.
Step Five: Remove Idler puller (I replaced new from Toyota)
Step Six: Take your short #3 philips head bit and place it in one of the screws holding the oil pump cover in place. Tap it with a small hammer for about 30 seconds. Be careful not to accidentally hit your radiator. I found that this does two things. It seats the philips bit into the head and shocks the bolt helping loosen things up.
continued on next post...
