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Oil Leak Repair

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SherpaPilot

SherpaPilot

Jedi Hopeful
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Greetings. Brand new member here. Been around British cars most of my life but have never attempted major surgery on the front end of the engine. I have a 72 TR6 with a consistent oil leak at the front end. I am thinking of replacing the front crank seal, front plate seal, and timing cover gaskets. My new shop manual tells me it is straight forward repair. What are the very best gaskets I can use on this engine and where can they be purchased. I am considering the ones Moss carries.
 
I get most of gaskets and seals from TRF (The Roadster Factory)
But have used Moss and Vicky Brit as well. Check the quality of the crank seal, there are several out there (try TRF) and on all the gaskets, I have had great luck with Permatex Aviation Sealer (there was an interesting stream of postings on this recently). Should go ahead and pop the radiator out for plenty of working room. I used a modified gear puller to get the crank pulley off. Just cut it up to where it would grip inside the spokes on the pulley wheel, and pulled. I used an air impact wrench to untighten (and tighten) the crank bolt. Have you considered changing that aluminum bridge with the steel one available out there. Lost the name of the fella that makes it (someone on the forum will respond - or Google the info). This is an area that invariably will leak because the 3 bolts on the front of the pan strip the aluminum oh-so-often. Pricey little thing but a permanent fix for this particular leak. (about 60-70 bucks)
Take your time and remember, clean, clean, clean when reinstalling everything.



Bill
 
I'm doing this exact same job right now. Bills advice is good, get the steel block bridge, or saddle bar, or sealing block, whatever it's called. When I dropped my sump last fall to replace the rod and main bearing I put this in while the pan was down, well worth it. The piece this guy makes is a work of art.

TR6 front engine sealing block

Anyway, when I did that I had to remove a piece of the lower front engine plate gasket. I made a little section of gasket to go back in there but it did not seal well, and was leaking when I shut the motor down. I just tore the whole front of the motor off this weekend and it'll be getting all new gaskets on the plate, the timing cover, and a new crank sleeve and seal (as well as some new paint on the plate and cover). Not a hard job at all, just take your time and make sure you put the crank and cam gears and chain back on correctly otherwise the motor will not be timed correctly. Not all that much work to get the pan down and replace that sealing block and the pan gasket. That'll also give you opportunity to clean the pan out while you've got it down.
 
Hi,

I've heard good reports about the steel saddle bar replacement (why did Triumph put fine threads in aluminum, d'oh!?), but wanted to offer a possible alternative, assuming the threads in your alumiunum one are bad.

You could also have it drilled & tapped larger and put thread inserts into the aluminum, and it would be at least as good as new, maybe better.

There are a number of different makers of coil type thread inserts. Helicoil probably is the most widely known. These work pretty well, but I very much prefer solid inserts like Time-sert, if at all possible.

Time-serts can be hard to find and, when you do, are often supplied in a major kit that's prohibitively expensive. So, check with local motorcycle shops, if you want to give Time-serts a try. They often use them to repair cases and other MC parts, and might be able to install just the two needed in the bridge piece.

In fact, Time-serts or Helicoils are also often installed in TR6 and other IRS Triumph rear trailing arms, which are aluminum and have some fine-threaded fittings that tend to strip. This is a very worthwhile upgrade there, too.

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Thanks for the great insight into this problem. All of your comments are appreciated and will be followed. Thanks again guys.
 
BTW, welcome to the forum and do come back and let us know how your efforts turned out. I was happy to see you post as my TR6 is in the shop at this time and I just found out today that I may need one of these saddle repairs. Now I have the site info that I needed, thanks to you and the others who watch the daily posts and add their expertise. This is really the best Triumph/LBC site going.
 
Re: Oil Leak Repair-Hello Sherpa Pilot

Hello & welcome:

Was all set to do the same job on my TR250 this winter, had leaks along front of block & valve cover. Found out that replacing the PCV (Gulp valve) that DPO took off solved all my problems. (Check to see your system is working properly before you do the gaskets & seal). Link to Moss: https://www.mossmotors.com/Shop/ViewProducts.aspx?PlateIndexID=36486

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Re: Oil Leak Repair-Hello Sherpa Pilot

I second ghj's tip on the PCV valve. I used to have significant drip from the rear oil seal. I replaced the Smiths PCV thing with a new NOS version and now not a single drop back there.
 
Re: Oil Leak Repair-Hello Sherpa Pilot

Good points about making sure there isn't too much pressure in the crankcase. That's a major cause of oil leaks.

One more thing to check on TRs is the condition of the flanges on the sump cover, primarily, and the front engine cover. These stamped steel covers can get mis-shapened if their fastening bolts are over-torqued. That happens when folks try to stop small leaks by tightening beyond the torque specs in the manual.

If and when you pull the front cover and/or sump pan, check that the flanges are not "belled up" around the holes, straighten as needed and also use a straightedge on them to see that they are relatively flat. Then be careful when reinstalling to use the proper amount of torque.

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