Just curious before I start ripping things apart.. Is replacing the rear main seal on a VG a simple drop the oil pan and throw it in deal or do I need to remove the crankshaft? I'm assuming I need to fix it as I just started to notice a small oil leak coming out right where the engine and transmission meet up.

thanks :-)

 

well there is no such thing as a simple job if not experienced with working on our max. Nah but you have to drop the tranny to access the rear main seal. It's alot of work but easy if you have a friend or two assortment of tool and a hoist. If you're gonna be down there then you might as well change the of the following.
-Input Shaft seals (driv, pass)
-Front anrd Rear main seals
-Oil pan (Re-seal, or gasket)
-Oil Change
-Timing Belt
-Motor/Trans Mounts
Or anything eles i failed to mention. Thats if you have a back-up car to use while in the process of the mention Items. This could tie up your weekend

 

Yep, you gotta drop the tranny to get to the rear main seal.

 

if he's at the rear main seal there's no need to do the t-belt unless necessary. it's at different ends of the motor.

 

i was stating if he was or had a hoist then i suggested that he might as well change the front also. To replace the front you have to remove the t-Belt

 

i guess my point is that he doesn't have to pull the entire motor out to change the rear main seal. if it's a daily driver then just unbolt the tranny from the engine and pull the main seal out that way and bolt it back up again and be done w/ it.

 

no he dos'nt it can be done with the engine in the car, but on the other hand he's gonna need a hoist to keep the engine elevated if the removal of the oil pan was needed. Like i said i was stating that if he was gonna change the rear seal then i referred him to a couple of other things that can be changed in the process.

 

What? no hoist needed. I did 2 5 speed swaps with out a hoist, he'll have no problems w/o one.

You just need a jack stand or wooden blocks under the oil pan and harmonic balancer.

The original poster doesn't even need to touch the timing belt area, thats just pointless labor unless its about time to change the timing belt/waterpump etc.

~Alex

 

a hoist is needed when cracking open the oil pan

 

you understand that you can support the engine from below right?

he's asking about changing the rear main seal..and that doesn't require dropping the pan.

 

Danny! You're Not getting my drift read what i said in the beggining thread. I know you dont need a hoist to change the rear main seal i did'nt on mine. You're misinterpeting the point I personally read the head topic VG REAR MAIN SEAL i was suggesting that he could replace some of the following items that i mention on a couple messages ago. I understand were you're comming from as far as just a simple change but there is others out there that like to fix other thing if attempting to fix one problem.

 

your gonna need a hammer and a flat head screwdriver to take that seal off of the housing plate that **** is a byiotch without one, and if you take the plate off your gonna need to either reseal that oilpan gasket (if it was silicone)or get a new one (if its that rubber crap and it broke into peices when you took off the pan) also the pic dosent show it but there are 2 bolts in the corner of the pan, all use a 10mm socket some extensions and maybee a u-joint or 2

 

i know what you're saying but if i'm changing a part sure someone would change items that's related. IE if i get a new alternator i would replace the alternator belt. if i flush the coolant i would get new hoses.

but to say that someone should replace the t-belt and related accessories associated w/ the t-belt while doing a rear main seal is unheard of. as you read others agreed with me here. a lot of people have these cars as daily drivers and to be down for a length of time for all that work on the engine might not work for these people.


i'm just pointing that out that you do NOT need to do the t-belt since it's not even near the region of the rear main seal and you do NOT have to hoist the engine up as you mention (quoted above) and the engine can be support from the bottom as alex mentioned. i'm just correcting the information for the OP just in case he gets his hands dirty on the job.

 

Can you please explain to me how you did this? The rear main seal is easy to put on and off. It is that piece of crap rubber gasket under it that I cannot put back and the bloody manual states that you have to drop the upper oil pan to do it properly.

Also someone mentioned that the timing belt has to be removed to change the rubber gasket on the front? So what am I up against here? JS

 

mebbe put the retainer on first and then push the seal into the retainer? i was re-sealing my oilpan anyways.... so i hoisted my motor in order to do so, but without hoisting, that's how i'd probably try it in order to avoid trouble with that stupid lip at the bottom.

 

I should clarify that I have a 4G Maxima and this is 3G forum. But I would think it a similar operation. I am looiking for whatever help I can get. Tomorrow I will attempt to hold the drivers side up with my hoist. Tranny is out. Then take off the crossmember and mounts and hope the engine doesn't shift much to get the upper oil pan off and reinstall. JS

 

oh... well probably the 4th gen section will help better but if you're gonna crack the oilpan open go ahead and scrape the old gasket off and reseal it too.

 

If you don't know when or if you timing belt has been changed or if its close to needing it I would say do that while your car is down already, you didn't say if you have a 5sp or a auto if you have a 5sp check the IPS seal and bearing (that could be whats leaking) and since you have the tranny out maybe check into the getting the IPS bearing done

 

You don't have to take off the oil pan to change the rear main seal. just pull the tranny and take a look.

If you REALLY want to pull the crossmember out, sling the engine by the exhaust manifolds and hold it in place with it while you pull the x member.

 

I beg to differ. We tried with all our resources to change the rear seal with just the tranny out. Problem is that you cannot just change the seal as in a normal car. Under the seal plate sits a rubber gasket that will not wedge in no matter how you try and therefore you have to pull the upper oil pan. Quite the job. I just got it all back together. Poor design by Nissan to say the least. JS

 

You don't have to drop the pan sir, just use a seal puller or a screwdriver and pop the old seal out and gently tap the new one in.... with a piece of wood or the old seal. Now if that half moon gasket is leaking that between the rear main seal housing and the oil pan. Then have at it....If you like it, we love it....

 

Hmm. funny.
I did it.
on VG, VE, and VQ30.

They all have the rubber oil pan lip seal, and you have to compress them while getting the crank seal on. it's a pain, but it's doable. I've done it probably 30 times in the last 5 years.

 

OK, interesting. I guess we are not as adept at this than others. For future reference can you give a short explanation on how you compress the rubber seal and still get the RMS bracket on without damaging it in the process. Did you use RTV on it or just squeeze it in. Are main concern was damaging the rubber gasket or the RMS in the process. JS

 

I put a thin layer of RTV on both sides and mashed it up into the goove on the seal bracket.
then I put another thin layer of RTV on the oil pan lip, which provided some 'lubrication' for the lip seal.
Then it's a matter of push and shove. you have to compress the lip seal somewhat to get the seal bracket down onto the alignment dowels, but it's doable. usually I'll shove it down far enough to get the screws started on both sides of the seal, then slowly crank those in and make sure I don't either break the bracket or otherwise FUBAR something on the way in. if you pay attention, you can use those bolts as a press to basically mash the thing in place.

done right, the whole process takes less time to do than it took me to type this up!

 

I REdid mine on my 4th gen (vq30) last thursday after doing it the thursday before along with the clutch, and a couple other things, simply for the reason thought we used enough rtv on the bracket but I knew it needed more! BTW, I didnt do the seal alone, I just bought the whole bracket from Brian and I didnt have to drop a pan or anything. Good flathead and hammer should do it, did for me.

 

that was a VQ john, but the principal is the same anyhows

 

Brian, go read post 16. :P

 

That was me. If you are poking fun at me that's OK. I am more familiar with Hondas and Austin Minis. This is my wife's DD and it had to be repaired. I'm retired so time is a non issue here.

All done and no leaks. Probably the hard way but it's in. Too bad I didn't find more info prior to the job. As I said, I was hesitant to just mash the gasket in there thinking if I damage it and it leaks later then I have to do it all over again.

As far as hanging the engine from the tranny side and leaving in the passenger mount, it worked just fine with no issues. Was solid more or less. You could swing it a bit but was supported well enough to do the work. Hope this is the last time I have to work on this beast for a while. It's a comfy car but some of the engineering in the engine bay sucks. Especially the shift rod bracket bolts and the RMS/gasket install. JS

 

I had a bit of trouble with those so I figured removing the crossmember was the solution and OMG what a difference after I pull it off. You can easily access those 12mm and 14mm bolts.

Glad you got it done though, I did it twice with a buddy from chicagomaximaclub and we hope not to do it again

 

I wasn't poking fun at all... Brian (internetautomart) came into the thread not knowing what the current discussion was about and blurted out the pics were from a 4th gen..... which is exactly what we were discussing and that you needed... (he's a little slow sometimes)

 

It's OK, I'm used to any sort of remarks from other boards. I have a 98 Audi to look after and a 87 Honda CRX that is one of the toys. An old DD that needs to be sold is a 91 Accord and last but not least is the project car, a 61 Austin Mini van that will be getting a Honda engine conversion in the near future.

Just had the Maxima at an alignment shop so we could take it for an 8 hour trip on Monday. When we put the axles back in I had to turn the steering almost to full lock on each side to get them into the hubs. Normally on most cars that should not throw the steering wheel off to an angle as it did on this car. I can see toe in and camber because you take the strut off and I had one of those adjustable bolts that would take it out of it's correct alignment.

In any case I have a seized outer tie rod end. I knew we had an issue on that side some time ago but never got around to fixing it. So now we take the other DD instead. Good thing I have a small fleet of vehicles to choose from as it seems one of them is always in need of repair. JS

 

Well what a coinscidence...I'm getting my alignment this week but I also just made an 11 hour each way drive from Chicago to Atlanta to pick up fellow orger 1992maximase30 and just did my rear main seal as well Oh and my fleet of vehicles are only nissan though...

 

but the thread title is VG

 

The RMS can be changed without removing the RMS housing! Just use a seal remover or decent size screwdriver and pop the old seal out while leaving the RMS housing installed. Then patiently tap in the new seal until flush with housing the entire circumference. Don't forget to lube those seal lips!!

 

yea but why go through all that trouble when for a couple extra dollars you can just save yourself time the extra work...

 

I'm a little late to the party but I've personally never seen the RMS itself leak on a VQ, regardless of mileage (200k+); and I've seen quite a few. It's always been the rubber gasket between the RMS retainer and oil pan. But I suppose it'd be worthwhile if the motor is getting up there in miles.

 

My vq had 289k when I did it 2 week ago and it was the seal not the silicone around the bracket or oil pan...now I'm about 500 miles away from 292,000 and still runs like new

I've been wanting to do the VGs forever cuz I doubt that the trans shop did it when they had my slushbox out. Since I was gonna convert to manual this past june with the help of maxitech I had the seal and everything needed from the dealer..maybe one day soon I can do it to the VG too