geeves

I could use some help. I'm trying to get the timing chain cover back on my 403 and having no luck. I've loosed the first 3 bolts on each side of the oil pan but just can't get the seal to go in. There is a rubber mallet sized hole in my drywall to prove how frustrated I am. The engine is in the car. Please post any tips you may have. Thanks

svnt442

You might need to loosen more bolts down both sides of the oil pan to get it in. The last thing that you want to do is to force a seal in place. All you'll end up doing is to tear the seal and end up having to replace it again. That is the last thing you want to deal with on the timing cover.

geeves

Thanks. I will loosen more bolts and think I am going to pick up another gasket set to be on the safe side.

svnt442

If you are getting a complete set you might want to get an oil pan set instead and just drop the pan. That would be a mild pain, but would make installing the cover much easier and at the same time make sure the pan doesn't leak.

olds 307 and 403

Quite often the bottom seal needs trimmed and use RTV on it, acts as a lubricant and helps seal. Joe P removed a dowel pin which helped the install, just getting it out is another story.

joe_padavano

Not just "quite often", but all the time.

Unfortunately, that wasn't intentional. The pin was stuck in the front cover and came out with it. This DID make reinstallation easier, though.

I've found that it can help to use long tapered alignment punches in a couple of the bolt holes to lever the seal down into the oil pan opening, allowing you to get the dowel pins into the holes in the cover. Once you get the bolts started, you can pull it in to place.

olds 307 and 403

Yeah, I should have said always. I don't think I have ever changed an Olds cover in car. I did a sbc, I wish Olds would have modified the crappy sbc design, just like they did with the distributor.

geeves

I plan to try to install the cover tomorrow. I have removed the first three pan bolts and loosened three more. Hopefully this is enough to get the pan to move far enough to get the cover in place. If not I will loosen more. The fourth ones were the hardest since they are above the axle and not easily accessed. We shall see. Wish me luck.

geeves

Was able to get the cover on today. I was a little confused by the torque specs. Read that 35# for the cover bolts and 13# for the water pump. But some of the water pump bolts secure the cover. There are 4 water pump bolts that screw directly into the front cover only and some go into the block. I tightened the bottom 4 bolts that don't go through the water pump to 35 and all the ones that go through the water pump to 13. Does that seem right? I think it does but not 100%

cjsdad

Never tried this on an Olds , but it worked on a F**d 351M400. Trimming the ends of the seal retainer like in the picture below will make it a lot easier to put back in.

TimingCoverTrim-1.jpg

joe_padavano

I've never found that retainer to be an issue on an Olds front cover. The two issues are:

1) You MUST trim the wings of the rubber bottom seal that are supposed to be sandwiched between the block and the oil pan in a "normal" installation. Just goop those corners with RTV.

2) The rubber seal itself is normally compressed by the oil pan when the pan is installed second (as when assembling the engine on a stand). Unfortunately, the two dowel pins that align the front cover are very tight (otherwise they'd be worthless as dowel pins) and have square corners, not bevels. This forces you to somehow compress the rubber seal against the oil pan to align the dowel pins with the holes in the front cover. This is the big problem with cover reinstallation. This is why I suggested using tapered alignment punches to "lever the cover down to compress the seal while trying to align the dowel pins. Of course, doing this requires the cover to be at an angle due to the pins sticking out, which makes it even more difficult to get the pins started.

joe_padavano

No, that is not right. Rule of thumb is that different diameter bolts will use different toques, and the water pump uses four 1/4" bolts and four 5/16" bolts.

The four 3/8" bolts at the bottom of the cover get torqued to 35 ft-lb.
The four 1/4" self tapping bolts that ONLY hold the water pump to the front cover get torqued to 13 ft-lbs. DO NOT OVER-TIGHTEN THESE!!!
The four 5/16" bolts that hold the water pump to the BLOCK get torqued to 25 ft-lbs.

As always, the info is right in your Chassis Service Manual:

geeves

Thanks Joe Padavano. That really helped. I have a copy of the service manual on CD. I have a hard time finding anything on there. I looked and was unable to find the picture you posted on my CD. I have a Haynes manual and that information is not in there.

joe_padavano

CSMs are year and sometimes model specific. You can easily find originals on ebay. Depending on the year, there may be a separate electrical manual also.