how hard is it to change the axle seals? my passenger side one is leaking so when i drive it gets all over the exhaust and burns and so on its a mess....

 

It's a little bit of a pain. I pulled out the axle when I had the exhaust off. I dunno if you can get to the bolts on the bracket without taking off the y-pipe. After that just pry out old seal and push in new one. Grease it up good and put the axle back in. Be carefull with the new seal, it's a little fragile.

 

alright thanx i just did the auto to 5 speed swap and i ran into that problem so otherwise i should be all set

 

Well I suppose it's better to tell you now rather than later...

Some oil leaks are caused by damaged seals. Others are caused by damaged transmission bearings. There are very many manual trannys with partly or really damaged bearings.

Start by changing both axle seals, but while you're down there and before you pull the axles, grab the big round (rusty) part of the axle by the tranny and see if you can find any up/down/forward/backward wiggle room. Any at all - it will be small if it's there. If you find that, expect that the seal replacement won't work. Unfortunately the best time to diagnose and fix the bearings is when the tranny is out of the car, so it would have been nice to know about that before making the swap. I hope you just have a nicked seal.

In any case, make sure there is enough gear oil in the tranny. Running low on oil will quickly destroy the good stuff inside.

Dave

 

to that