So my '84 f-150 has a minor oil leak on the front end of the engine. Enough to make a puddle over time in the driveway, and just be an annoyance. I have a oil pan gasket coming in tomorrow morning at a local shop and have a few questions about the process.

A little bit of Info:
The oil drips down out of the center bolt, of the three front most bolts that is part of the curve, that meets up at the timing cover in the front. I originally thought that it was the cover's gasket, so i tore half the engine apart, and put it back together, but it turns out it wasn't the timing gasket after all.

Since i put that timing chain cover back on, i must have disturbed the gasket (which looked fine, or so it seemed) and it is starting to leak and the fan is spraying it all over my belts, lower radiator hose, and harmonic balancer. It is not a fast leak, but enough that it has made a mess.

While i know that you should pull the engine, or lift it up some while doing this, i don't have the money, nor the equipment to remove the engine right now. Plus, i didn't give too much for this truck and don't want to dump $400 on having my local shop do it.

QUESTION IS...
In theory, i want to drop the oil pan and let it rest on the cross member, just enough to sneak a new gasket in place. Just enough room to remove the old gasket, put the new one on, and close it back up, and with any luck, leak is fixed.

Anyone with a bit more inline-6 experience tried this, or suggestions?

 

I did it years ago, with an F250. I loosened the fan shroud, removed motor mount, and trans mount bolts, and used a floor jack and block of wood, to jack up the motor for clearance.

 

It sounds like you're wanting to do this without even jacking the engine up, correct? If so, I'm going to suggest that you go through the extra trouble of jacking it. The reason I say this is that you're really going to want to make sure the mating surfaces on the block and on the old pan are CLEAN before putting the new gasket on, and there's not enough room to do this task correctly if you can't get the pan completely out of the truck.

It's really not that bad of a job...I did it a couple of years ago on my 1980, and I don't have a lot of patience for complex removal and reassembly tasks on vehicles. My truck is an automatic, so I unbolted the two motor mounts, loosened (but did not remove) the mounting bolt at the tail of the transmission, and was able to jack the engine using a block of wood and a bottle jack under the oil pan. Once I got a piece of 2x4 between the engine and each of the motor mounts I lowered it back down, and that gave me room to remove the oil pan. From there it was a piece of cake.

Because I wanted to never do the job again, I bought a good (Fel-Pro) one-piece gasket, plus a new oil pan. Not sure about your pan, but the older ones had ridges and whatnot that don't work well with the one-piece gasket. People say you can grind the ridges down, but see above about patience...I was happier buying a pan I didn't have to mess with, plus I knew it would be straight. Put it all together, torqued it to spec, and it hasn't leaked yet.

Lowering the engine was almost as easy as raising it. The only problem I had was that when it came back down, the motor had slipped backwards a half-inch and the motor mount bolts didn't go back into the holes in the perches. My solution was to let the engine rest on the bolts on the perches (this didn't seem to damage anything), then use the bottle jack wedged between the tail of the transmission and a crossmember to jack the engine forward until it dropped into place. Then I tightened everything up and was on my way.

 

Agreed. If the existing gasket is the original style, it is now baked on and won't come off without a fight. In addition to not being able to get a good sealing surface, you will also end up with crud falling into the pan.

Here's a thread in the stickies showing the in-truck process on a straight 6:

https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...l#post12882430

BTW, I just heard from the ghost of Carnac the Magnificant. He predicted the next reply will say how much easier it is to just remove the engine.

 

I replaced the oil pan gasket last summer without lifting motor. It was the newer one piece gasket that came off fairly easily. If yours has the older cork gasket, you can finagle oil pan down enough to scrape the old gasket off. Also can reach inside of pan and vacuum out or wipe clean with rag. Fortunately even with 255,000 miles on motor there was no residue or sediment in bottom of pan. If a newer one piece gasket will work with the ribbed oil pan, I would highly recommend it. That was the easiest replacement I have done in vehicle. It took some time but went without any issues. I was covered in oil since it was all over bottom of motor and cross member. But was so nice to start up afterwards and not a drop since then.