Rear main seal with repair sleeve

andrewr · Aug 6, 2016

Hi everyone, so sorry I do not have time to do a proper intro thread right now both my dad and I are ranger owners and love them but today not much time to talk, we are trying to do the rear main seal on his 1994 4.0 engine and we are confused and in disagreement about some install specifics.

We have the felpro seal that comes with the repair sleeve or wear sleeve or whatever you want to call it. This motor did not have the sleeve previously but dad is convinced it is necessary to prevent future oil leaks. So fine we are going to put it on but now he is overthinking how the sleeve goes on.

He is wondering whether the sleeve goes on first or not. Now I know that may sound like a silly question but bear with me he is simply overthinking it I'm sur we've all done it a time or two.
Additionally, he is not sure which direction the flange should face...

It seems to me the sleeve must go on first, flange side IN to its specified depth and then the seal onto the sleeve, right? I'm starting to feel silly just typing this out because had he not raised so many questions about creative strange ways these two parts could theoretically be installed I would never have had any doubts but that overthinking thing is apparently contagious...

Our parts came with no instructions so it would make him feel a lot better to have some confirmation before we put this thing back together.

Thanks everyone and sorry again for the rushed first post, but rangers rock!

black_demon69 · Aug 6, 2016

andrewr said:
Hi everyone, so sorry I do not have time to do a proper intro thread right now both my dad and I are ranger owners and love them but today not much time to talk, we are trying to do the rear main seal on his 1994 4.0 engine and we are confused and in disagreement about some install specifics.

We have the felpro seal that comes with the repair sleeve or wear sleeve or whatever you want to call it. This motor did not have the sleeve previously but dad is convinced it is necessary to prevent future oil leaks. So fine we are going to put it on but now he is overthinking how the sleeve goes on.

He is wondering whether the sleeve goes on first or not. Now I know that may sound like a silly question but bear with me he is simply overthinking it I'm sur we've all done it a time or two.
Additionally, he is not sure which direction the flange should face...

It seems to me the sleeve must go on first, flange side IN to its specified depth and then the seal onto the sleeve, right? I'm starting to feel silly just typing this out because had he not raised so many questions about creative strange ways these two parts could theoretically be installed I would never have had any doubts but that overthinking thing is apparently contagious...

Our parts came with no instructions so it would make him feel a lot better to have some confirmation before we put this thing back together.

Thanks everyone and sorry again for the rushed first post, but rangers rock!

sleeve first flange in
seal second

i like to put a thin coating of rtv on inside of sleeve (however don't know if needed) also if using rtv clean oil off of crank and sleeve.

andrewr · Aug 6, 2016

Thank you! For anyone else who stumbles across this looking for the same thing another member PM'd me this link with a great overview of the whole process:

http://www.binderplanet.com/forums/index.php?threads/rear-main-seal-repair-sleeve-install.112502/

So you have to remove that flange/lip it looks like? This website was the first I had ever heard of that being a thing, anyone else able to confirm?

It wouldn't have killed felpro to throw a little sheet of paper in the box telling us about removing the flange/lip, I would not have thought that neccesary.

andrewr · Aug 8, 2016

Upon further inspection, our seal and sleeve is a little different than what was shown in the link I posted. There is no way the flange tears off this one like the one in the link does, its way too thick for that, and there is a definite intended wear surface on the sleeve for the seal which only lines up properly if the flange side is out. We puzzled over it for a while, Dad talked to several mechanics in our area and nobody knows for sure how these dumb things are supposed to go in. At this point, he is just going to take a wild guess and go for it. Flange side will be out towards the flywheel. It will be a while before this motor is back in service but I will try to come back and post an update once it is to let you know how it turns out.

alwaysFlOoReD · Aug 8, 2016

AFAIK; I agree with black demon. The seal rides on the crank and over time can create a groove in the crank. The repair flange is supposed to give a new surface for the seal to ride against. The lip would be for installation purposes only [IMO] so would need to be installed to the engine side so the seal can slip over the new surface.

black_demon69 · Aug 8, 2016

alwaysFlOoReD said:
AFAIK; I agree with black demon. The seal rides on the crank and over time can create a groove in the crank. The repair flange is supposed to give a new surface for the seal to ride against. The lip would be for installation purposes only [IMO] so would need to be installed to the engine side so the seal can slip over the new surface.

yes listen to always floored

hes got the right idea

RonD · Aug 8, 2016

You don't have to remove the lip on the sleeve, but it definitely goes on FIRST, then the seal.

You just have to make sure the lip is not going to rub on the engine when crank turns, so put it on crank and tap it back enough to clear where the seal will ride on it.
Grind off any that sticks out past the end of the crank and then lube and install the rubber main seal.
Do not use teflon seals with sleeves

andrewr · Oct 1, 2016

Just writing in to let you know I did not abandon this thread, he still has not put this engine back into the truck yet so we just don't have any conclusions yet. This thread can be moved out of the urgent/need help fast any time the mods would like (or is that something I can do myself?) Thanks again guys

Andy D · Oct 1, 2016

Same yr, same engine. In order to stay out of wear ring on the crank, I drove the seal in a bit deeper to put the lip in a fresh area. I learned it from BIL.

Rear main seal with repair sleeve

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