Curious as to how involved removing an oil pan will be...

[DTMAce]

Yeah. Oil pan.

I hit it on a fucking rock today in someone's driveway. Put a small crack and couple of seeper holes in it, enough to drop the oil to nothing in roughly 45 minutes. I went maybe 2 miles before seeing the pressure gauge drop to 0 a couple times. Nothing bad happened though, pulled over and killed it once I realized what the hell was going on.

Yes to the obvious question I did hear it hit something, but I had no clue it was the aluminum oil pan. The rock was not visible at the time, and I had been in this guy's driveway a few times but with the van, not the Z. All I can think is the car came down on the rock due to the contour of the driveway, otherwise it would have clobbered the Z lip and the lower rad support. None of that got touched. I thought it had hit the bottom of the rad support or one of the lower skids.

No I did not know the rock was there till today when I hit it. The customer did not even think to tell me about it either but he felt bad cause he knew it was there too. He did help me getting it going enough to get home.

Anyway, I prevented it from damage and managed to get it limped home by using some quick thinking and a bit of plumber putty. Didn't hold long, but it held long enough to make it back home. Had to put 5 more quarts of oil in it, which by now is completely out of it again. *sigh

Now I have to pull the pan, weld the crack and hole shut and put it back on. Just wanted to know if I can do this fairly easily or if its going to be a major hassle.

Thanks guys.

[Wanako]

If I remember right, you'll have to remove the starter to get to some bolts on the oil pan, at least that's how it was on my 2.8. You can remove it after that. Other than the starter, it's no big deal.

[Barry]

It sucks to do it with the automatic. There's 6 bolts on the side of the pan that go into the bearing caps. 3 on the front 3 back

[woody90gtz]

And the auto has that snout going across the back of the engine right by the oil pan.

Are you planning to have someone TIG it? It takes someone who really knows what they are doing to weld cast aluminum correctly.

[3X00-Modified]

And no one mentioned the deal breaker.... You need to drop the passenger side sub-frame otherwise you'll never get the right side of the pan down far enough to remove it from the car.

He probably wants to just replace it... and if so I do have one pan somewhere if you need it.

[DTMAce]

No, I was going to have it welded. My dad is an expert at welding anything, and has a TIG to boot. He does run a welding shop as a side business...

Sounds like its going to be a bitch though. *sigh

So on mine the starter has to come off...? Most likely will have to drop the pass sub frame..... And whats that about the transmission? Are you saying it will be in the way of getting it off, or just make it difficult to get to the bolts? lol

There is a slight possibility that he might be able to TIG it right there on the car without having to drop the pan at all, but I figured we would need to pull it to keep the oil contamination of the weld area to a minimum, not to mention fire hazards.... lol

I do know what a bitch it is to weld on metal that has a lot of oil or residue in the metal or on the metal. Tends to cause it to leave pin holes if you aren't careful.. My thought was to pull it, clean it, weld it, and slap it back on there. HA. Guess we will see.

Let me know about the starter if it has to be pulled for sure or not.

[3X00-Modified]

yes starter has to be removed, and the rear bolts will just be a pain in the ass to get to with the trans there. It is possible though. And its a definite on sub-frame removal, or at least dropping it a few inches to clear the crank with the pan.

[heavywoody]

I've done this more than I care to admit.

Remove these items:
Starter
Passenger side dogbone bracket
Oil filter adapter
Flywheel inspection plate
Subframe (can be dropped partway - you don't have to completely remove it; must disconnect the swaybar endlink and/or the ball joint to drop it easily enough IIRC)
Bolts going into bottom of the block
Bolts going into the main cap (as mentioned above)
Disconnect wiring for low oil level sensor

Pan might need some prodding to get off; factory uses dabs of RTV to seal on the rear main seal area.

Have fun Especially with it being a MI car...

[DTMAce]

Have fun Especially with it being a MI car...

What does that mean? Why should an MI car be any different? I did buy it in OH after all. lol

[heavywoody]

If you haven't taken the subframe stuff apart in the 200K+ driving you've done in MI... yeah lol. I used to live in MI, but my stuff has been apart so many times that it's a cake walk now lol.

[DTMAce]

Well its only been in MI for the last 5 years. I would say any car that has over 200k on it will be a bastard more than what state they are from. Mine has spent most of its life in Ohio, with about 4 years in IL, then 5 in MI.

And in the whole time its been in MI I have only put about 10k on it, and not during the winter.

[heavywoody]

True, but it's not like OH or IL don't use loads of salt on the roads

[Cliff8928]

IL probably uses more than MI.