Chet

Whats involved in replacing the front crank seal, I seem to have developed a small leak there? I know the harmonic balancer needs to come off, anything else?

rsn932

Assuming you are talking about a 1988 engine, the front crank seal is actually part of the oil pan gasket. You would have to figure out a way to drop the oil pan by raising the engine a little bit and replace the whole gasket. I've never done it, but I don't think you need to take the balancer off. Just take off the oil pan, somehow line up the new gasket, and put the pan back on.

88IROCZ350

actually if your talking about the seal that seals around the balancer you done need to remove the oil pan. Just pull off the balancer and timing cover and put a new seal on and make sure your balancer surfaces is free of burrs and smooth. They make sleeve kits to fix a messed up balancer surface if you have that problem. You can get the timing cover back in without taking the pan off but its not easy with a 1 piece seal. Hope that helps

DENN_SHAH

iTrader: (1)

you can replace the front seal without pulling the timing cover, just the belt, lower pully, & balancer.
go slow & be gentle going back in with the new seal & it should be fine.

like 88IROCZ350 said, make sure the balancer is good, if it has much of a groove cut into it, it needs a shaft saver.