Rear main seal replacement on 98 Cherokee

A good local shop should be able to do that a lot cheaper than a dealership.

Speaking about the I6 here.

The front seal much harder than the rear. It's not just drop the pan and push out. You have to remove the harmonic balancer, timing chain cover, timing chain, etc.. then the seal can be replaced. It's one solid unit unlike the rear.

Generally you don't bother unless it's leaking.

I would have whoever you do the work look at the harmonic balancer to make sure it hasn't cracked or started to walk. mine did about that time.

What Doug said.

But there is the usual statement about check> Hello all,

tp://revbeergoggles.com/hb/

Thanks for the advice Doug. I will checkout a local shop.

Larry

Thanks for the suggestion. I did have the valve cover gasket replaced a year ago, however I will check that just in case.

Larry

+1

Good catch, that little PITA slipped my mind.

Here are some interesting cost estimates and tidbits from my checking with "local garages" concerning replacing the rear main seal on my 98 Cherokee I thought you might enjoy.

Dealer.....est. $400...drop oil pan and replace seal and pan gasket. Local Garage One....Can't give you an estimate as it might involve a lot of work. Have you checked the pcv plug on top of the valve cover? (He said it should be replaced as it might be plugged) Local Garage Two.....est. $360...drop oil pan and replace seal and pan gasket. Local Garage Three...est. $390...will remove the transmission to get to the seal to which I asked "Are you sure?" and the response..."Oh yes!" If they knew that they just had to remove the oil pan it might have been much cheaper. But what else don't they know. (They walk among us!)

Thanks again.

Larry

Try here.

Fairly good, but not always accurate on parts.

I think it took me about 3 hours to replace both front and rear seals. Damned pan gasket cost as much as anything else, AIR. I did have the advantage of having replaced the harmonic balancer and I do own a set of seal pullers so that helped a lot. Good excuse to drink a beer or two and I only had three PITA issues: 1. remove the starter and it's a lot easier to manuver the pan. 2. The rear seal is a split seal - make sure you have a a

1/4 or 5/16 brass rod to use as a punch and a BMFH to drive the top half out (it grows in there!). 3. getting the pan back on is a bear just because of positioning the gasket and the length of the sides. A tack coat of RTV to hold it on is useful and 4 studs to temporarily act as guides make it easier.

Does that approach $400 worth of labor????

Hi Will,

I wished I could do it myself.

Larry

Interesting website! The lowest estimate is within $55 of the website estimate, however, the site left out oil pan gasket, oil, and oil filter replacements. But the site is a good reference point tho.

Thanks

Larry

Yea, you have to build the job up bit by bit. It's simiar to the costing tools used by most garages these days.

You have a `98 that has been driven only 5500 miles a year? Yowsers.

That was my first thought too. But then I figured maybe it was driven

7200 for the first 10 years and set up without running for the last 3 years. Couldn't non-use for a few years be the reason for the seal to dry out and fail? -shrug- I dunno, just speculating.

Mine's a '99 model with 170,000 but it's at least cranked up almost every day. It's only had normal maintenance (oil changes, filters, plugs, etc) and has no leaks whatsoever.

Rick

The '95 Wrangler I just bought my wife only had 117,000 on it. Only leak I've found so far is the rear output shaft of the t/case. Took about 20 min to crawl under it and fix it.