Replacing Front Seal

[BASS]

Ok, I have a really bad oil leak (drips like craazy when just idling and/or parked) and it appears that the front seal is bad. How hard is it to replace this, and are there any special tricks in doing so?? Thanks

 

[blkcorvair]

On a 79 Midget I presume?

You need a 1 13/16 socket for the crank pulley. Un-do the motor mounts and jack the engine up enough to slide the pulley off. (You will probably have to get the fan and radiator out of your way. Pull the timing cover and replace the seal. (Its in the timing cover.) You need a seal and a timing cover gasket and some new antifreeze should do it.

 

[recordsj]

i have a 1500 mg midget. I ran into the same problem after replacing the timing chain and sprockets. After I got it back together and up and running, noticed a bad leak on the timing cover. I did clean the metal surface on the cover and engine and placed a new gasket with applying gasket sealant (permatex 98H, High Tack gasket sealant), but it still leaked.

I think the main issue is that when I was tightening a couple of the bolts for the cover, the internal threads were stripping, which probably means the cover in that area is not getting a good compressions on the gasket to seal. So maybe by removing the timing cover off again and cleaning the sealing surface up again and using a new gasket and placing a small bead of RTV sealant on both sealing surfaces would help this issue?

 

[jlaird]

I bet that would hold it.