Hi All,
The FB hasn’t moved for a couple of weeks and I’ve got 3 small oil puddles on the floor.
One from the gear selector thingy
Another from the clutch actuator thingy
... and another from the front of the motor somewhere, but I’ll have to take the bottom bash plate? off to see from where exactly.
I’m no mechanic, but I’ll have a go unless it’s beyond me. Any advice on where I should start with the first two leakers?
Clutch slave cylinder may be leaking fluid or it could be coming from elsewhere. Hydraulic fluid is easy to distinguish from oil. For a start it will be cleaner. Fair chance the rubber is shot. If so you can have a go at cleaning up the barrel with emery paper and fit new rubber after cleaning it all up.
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getting my FB ute on the road
EK van on rotisserie
I would replace the gearbox seal and fit a new slave cylinder - they arent expensive.
Leaks from the front of the donk are probably timing cover seal related, you will need a harmonic balancer puller tool to remove the harmonic balancer. Grey motor balancers are different to the norm , you cant use a normal 3 leg type or universal puller on them.
I started with nothing and still have most of it left.
Foundation member #61 of FB/EK Holden club of W.A.
"If your Holden isn't leaking oil, it doesn't have any."
The leaks from the gearbox selector levers are normal. Even the manual says, "An occasional drop of oil is normal and does not warrant further attention." Sure, you can go to all the effort of having the seals replaced, but it may not cure the leaks (this is the voice of experience talking here).
To confirm brake fluid leaking from the slave cylinder, wipe all the dirt off the rubber boot, then peel the boot back and take a look inside the cylinder. If the inside of the cylinder's wet with fluid, well, yes, you have a brake fluid leak. I drove my EK for years with a slow leak in the clutch hydraulics. When the clutch pedal was slow to come back off the floor, I'd top the clutch master cylinder up. My FC's the same. My new clutch slave cylinder started leaking after a couple of years. It's now six years old, and still isn't leaking fast enough for me to be bothered replacing it.
To locate the engine oil leak, you'll need a rag and some degreaser or kero. Find the timing case oil seal, and wipe the timing case and front engine mount plate clean below the harmonic balancer. Also wipe the rear face of the front engine mount plate clean, where it meets up with the sump. When these two places are clean and dry, take the car for a drive for about half an hour. Let the engine cool down a bit afterwards.
Wipe your finger along the underside of the timing case below the seal. If it comes up oily, your timing case oil seal's leaking.
Wipe your finger along the backside of the front engine mount plate below the sump, but above the front engine mount. If your finger comes up oily, then you have an oil leak between the front engine mount plate and the block.
Replacing a leaking timing case oil seal's a pain in the arse, but absolutely nothing compared with fixing an oil leak from behind the front engine mount plate. That is a full engine-out job. See "Leroy the EK ute" for details.
When you've located the engine oil leaks and worked out how fast or slow they are, then you'll have to make the call about whether you'll get them fixed.
You don't have yearly rego inspections in WA, do you? If you need to get the initial inspection done, do what everybody else does: degrease the motor and gearbox immediately before taking it to the inspection. And take a shop manual with you, with the magic words about oil leaks bookmarked, in case the inspector applies 2018 standards to a 1960 car.
I wouldn't touch anything unless absolutely necessary.
Thanks a lot Clay, Blacky and Rob. I think I’ll take the easy route first and clean all three areas up and work it out from there. They don’t seem too bad going by the amount on the floor.
Blacky, when you say gearbox seal which one do you mean? I’ve had a look in the manual and there’s a few seals/gaskets in there.
If I need to replace/pull bits apart, I’ll be back here asking you guys if I can’t work it out from the manual
Thanks again, guys. Really appreciate it.
Cheers,
John
My EK's selector lever shaft seal (tapered cork seal that fits the vertical shaft) is leaking; however, my mechanic has advised me that it can't be fixed as the tapered cork seal is not available in any gearbox kit except from Rare Spares and theirs is far too big.
I've heard that you can have a reasonable chance of success with a suitably sized O-ring. ID of 1/4" and maybe 1/16" to 5/64" cross-section (6 mm ID and 1.5 to 2.0 mm cross-section) would be a good start.
BTW, the cork seal is not tapered when new. Or, if you've got a couple of wad punches, make one yourself out of a section of sump gasket, or the stiffening piece from a pushrod cover gasket.
The Rares kit is fine, but this is also good advice:
ardiesse wrote: Thu May 28, 2020 12:40 pm
BTW, the cork seal is not tapered when new. Or, if you've got a couple of wad punches, make one yourself out of a section of sump gasket, or the stiffening piece from a pushrod cover gasket.
Cheers,
Harv
327 Chev EK wagon, original EK ute for Number 1 Daughter, an FB sedan meth monster project and a BB/MD grey motored FED.
