Changing cam on old style 350 how far does the oil pan have to drop to get cover off?

[Footjoy]

Hi

I have to look at timing gears and I have the balancer off. It has a 1 piece oil pan gasket and I am curious if I can do this in the car and save the gasket. So how far does the pan have to drop so timing cover can clear and be removed.

Thanks

Greg

[silvermonte]

Depending on how close your oil pan sits to the cross member will be the main factor on the amount of work. You will have to take out about the front half of the oil pan bolts and then loosen up the back half of the bolts. If there in not enough room to drop the pan about two inches you will have to pull out the motor mount bolts and lift the engine. Ive never had very good luck with keeping oil from leaking after doing it that way, so any more I just pull the engine and take the entire pan off and make sure everything is clean before putting it back together.

[JEFFTATE]

The oil pan on an old school 350 has to at least come loose and get out of the way to get the front cover off. ( as described above in silvermontes post )

Now, that being said , I have taken the front cover off by taking all the bolts out of the front cover and wiggling it off its dowel pins and tilting it forward at the top .
Without taking the oil pan loose ..
The front cover will tilt forward and the lip that overlaps the front oil pan rail will be a tight fit, but you can do it .
Be careful not to bend the front cover or oil pan too much ..
The big problem is getting the front cover back on without removing the oil pan and getting the oil pan gasket to seal back up against the front cover .

It's a much better idea to take the oil pan loose ..

[BuzzKillian]

I did as Jeff suggested on a 4.3 S-10. To re-install the timing chain cover, I clipped a small amount from the corners of the groove that holds the gasket. I put a generous amount of silicone on the corners and popped it back on. It didn't leak.

I just noticed you say it has a 1 piece gasket... I'm not sure this will work, but that would stop me from trying.

[minendrews68]

Im telling ya' drop the pan, and clean everything before putting it back together. I know some have had good luck just dropping the front of the pan and getting the timing chain cover off, but I never have. I know the one piece oil pan gaskets are a lot more expensive than the regular ones, but you'll thank yourself when you go to put it back together. Those things are awesome.

[TheJDMan]

I have had mixed results with the one piece 1st gen SBC pan gaskets. I have had very poor results trying to take the timing cover off with out removing the pan. I would also recommend dropping the pan but if you don't and need to reseal the timing cover be sure to use the "Ultra Black" RTV.