Oil pump install.

So I was there minding my own business when my buddy calls up and asks for help changing the oil pump. We'd done it before, during the rebuild but...well, left off the stupid gasket so there was some WAY low pressure. I asked if I could take some pictures for a write up. He said "Sure, bra, as long as you put one of us in there." So here we are with our bag of shit ready to go on the vehicle, a 79 Bronco with a 400:



This is what the problem was:


I'm not sure that zero oil pressure after warming up is part of the plan.

So, we gathered our stuff up. Included in the chaos is a tube of RTV, new oil pan gasket set, oil drain pan and a Melling high volume pump with a pickup from Summit and a hardened oil pump drive shaft. Here's the thing...the old pickup had to be reused. The new one was, apparently, for a front sump vehicle. Which we dont have.



Anyhow, after you get all that laid out, start draining oil and pull off your starter. If you have a regular vehicle, it's two bolts. Mine has one. Set it aside and dont let it hang by the wire.

I had decided to run a can of Seafoam through the engine for about 20 minutes before draining the oil. The down side is that it made the oil come out like water, scorch the hell out of my arm and blow all over in the wind we had today.



Start pulling oil pan bolts. A little magnet bowl helps keep stuff in order here. You'll have about a zillion of them rolling around all over the place. Now is a good time to think about putting the oil drain plug back in so the little remaining oil stays in the pan 'till you can deal with it.

Before you start yanking on your pan trying to get it out, remember a couple of things: You MAY need to jack the body up and let the axle droop just a little and you MAY have the dip stick attached to an exhaust manifold bolt. Take stock before getting too angry and just ripping it out.

Here's where your dipstick attaches to the manifold:


After getting the pan loose, grab a box end wrench and you've got either two (like me) or 3 (like Ford designed it) bolts to remove to dislodge the pump. Just let it fall into the pan, along with the bolts and the oil pump drive shaft. You'll deal with them later.



Now comes the fun part; I found that I was JUST able to remove and install the pan with no jacking. And I mean JUST. It was close enough that to install it without disturbing the gasket too much, I had to remove the drain plug. This vehicle has a 4" lift.

Anyhow, now you need to grab your handy gasket scraper and remove ALL of the old gasket from both the engine and the pan. Dont forget any gasket from where the oil pump went onto the block!

You can see here that some of it tried to hide in the little area near the rear main seal. Sneaky, but a nice worn out screw driver was able to just get in there and pull it all out.



Also be careful around the ridged areas at the front and back of the pan. RTV loves to hide here and make it a bear to get a good seal:


If you are going to re-use your oil pick up, spray it out well with air, cleaner or ill-will. Mine was doing a bang up job of collecting 10 years of dust and crap:


When I had the pan dropped last time, I installed a neodymium magnet in the bottom. Since it'd just been rebuilt, there was all KINDS of nasty stuff that collected on it. It looked like a tiny Tribble.


The only other thing I can think of to do with the pan off (Unless you need to slip a new rear main seal in) is to take care of any leaks you may have from the dip stick. This abortion seems to work just fine: No more leaks.

Ok, now about that pan gasket. If you have your tricks on how to do it, skip this part. If you wonder how to do it, do not skip this part.

Step one, slather some RTV all over the pan side of the seal face. Really goop it on there and then smooth it out with your finger. That way, when you drop your new (cork) gasket on there, it'll stick. Like so:

Dont forget the ends: You'll need a lot here.


The blue stuff will start to cure almost right away. So just press your gasket on there, put all the bolts through the holes to keep it lined up and have a beer. By the time you finish, should be dry enough to have that gasket really stuck on there.

Should look something like this:



After your beer or whatever time holder you have, do the other side:



Let this cure while you RTV the gasket onto the oil pump and secure it with two bolts.

About the time you get the RTV onto the pump, you should be good to go to make sure that your pan gasket is still lined up and start getting ready to re-install. Make sure that your pan is still nice and clean. Put your (optional) magnet back into it.



When you feel youre ready, drop the pump into the pan and start fishing it back into place. I had to remove the drain plug to be able to get the thing back in without scraping the gasket right off of it.

With much wailing and gnashing of teeth, you should have this:
This is the pump, loosely installed, and the drive shaft sitting in the drive shaft socket. Sorry you cant actually SEE the new shaft in there, but it's there. Shafting.

Ok, so tighten 'er up and start working on getting a bolt or two installed on each side of the pan. Once you get that, it's only a matter of patience before you can get all the bolts in and torqued. I did this in 3 steps to (hopefully) avoid splitting the gasket.

So, remember to put on a new oil filter and re-attach your dip stick fastening flange thingy:



Add some fresh oil



You DID remember to install the drain plug, right?

Anyhow, with any good fortune you should have something like this after you finish:



That's at an idle, all warmed up and over 75 lbs of pressure.

The big thing I learned from this: never EVER re-use this gasket. The whole reason I had low pressure, was that the gasket on the pump tore and was blown out.

Good luck and have fun!