I've been battling an oil leak on the front of my 360 for a couple of weeks. It has been there months, maybe years, but has recently gotten worse. I couldn't tell exactly where it was coming from, but it was up front, near the oil pump, and was dripping off the oil pan lip onto the front axle. The guys at the oil change place told me it was the oil pump housing. So I took it apart and reassembled it with a new gasket. No better. Next, I replaced the oil pan gasket. I had done this a couple of years ago due to a leaking rear main seal, but didn't like the way it went back together, so I wanted to re-do it anyway. Got it right this time, but the leak was no better. My thoughts went to the possibility of the timing cover and I was really dreading taking everything off the front of the engine to redo that thing. Then a wise mechanic friend asked if I'd snugged up on the bolts. So that's what I did and that was the trick. Some of those bolts are mighty hard to get to. They're well hidden behind things like the harmonic balancer, the oil pump and the fuel pump. Some I could barely put a finger on, no way to get a wrench on them. But I got a quarter to a half turn on 4 of them near the bottom. Leak fixed. I just thought I'd share this in case anyone else out there with a leaky AMC V-8 might be having the same problem. Mark.
- posted
18 years ago