Hi all,
I have a 1991 B250 with the 318. Last fall I did the storage oil change for winter and noticed that the oil was coming out in spurts like it was being blocked at the drain. I had the dipstick pulled and I've never seen this before so it has been bugging me ever since.
Can the oil pan be removed without significant movement of the engine? I need to get this figured out for the spring because I am concerned debris could plug up my oil pump screen and fry my engine while out on vacation. It's -25C outside right now so I'm not excited about digging the van out of the snow to look.
I was also surprised to see how inexpensive the long blocks are on Rock Auto. People are paying about 3 times the amount for a rebuilt HEMI. Gotta love a simple engine.
Cheers, Steve

 

You have to lift the engine about 4-5 inches to be able to remove the oil pan.

 

Thanks for the info, I'll have to set aside enough time to do this in one shot. I guess I'll change the engine mounts at the same time as they are original and the engine seems to lean to the drivers side.
Steve

 

hey there, I've removed my oil pan a few times on my '96 318. Never had to lift the engine. notice underneath, the exhaust crossover pipe sits underneath the pan. you can disconnect the exhaust pipe from both manifolds, and get the pan out that way. Unfotunately, my exhaust pipe was rusted to the manifold on the passenger bank, so i used a ratchet strap to hold the pipe out of the way during removal.

 

In the end I had to remove the fasteners on the engine mounts, the driver side stiffener below the starter, and then jack up the engine. I used a long 3/8" drive extension on the jack but it bent...should have used a 1/2" drive. After you have it lifted up you slide the pan backward and it'll just wiggle out under the y-pipe.

I found that some of the rubber pan gasket from the front or rear had come loose and was blocking the oil drain so it wasn't anything major. The cork/metal part of the gasket was in great shape and very time consuming to clean up.

 

Nice work.

 

How was the inside bottom of the pan, gunked up with sludge or clean?

 

Absolutely clean, nothing to scrape or dig out. I have been using synthetic and the odd engine flush for the past few years so that keeps the inside of the engine in good shape. I was expecting to find something because the oil turns dark in this engine quickly but nada. I believe it was just as clean up top a few years ago when I changed the valve seals.

If I were to do this again...I would have changed the rear main seal too. I did not notice until I was checking for torque specs but you need to take off the oil pan and pull the rear main bearing to change that seal.

Getting the oil pan back in with the rubber seal portions attached to the pan was ridiculous. I had to mash the flexplate cover to get the pan in between the oil pump and the flexplate cover. I blew a lot of time trying to remove the cover which doesn't seem possible before I resorted to that.