Please, nobody say, "With a fish." Ork! Ork!

The workbench has a stack of fresh seals waiting, as part of the never-ending timing belt job. The crank and balance seals in the motor look pretty good after 90K and nine years on the job, but I don't trust them to go another 90K.

The cam seal is starting to disintegrate in the bore. That one would probably have gone (and oiled the belt) sometime in the next 10K.

Thanks to people who warned me to change seals! Now I just have to get the old ones out. All my previous seal changes have been on Yankee V-8s and German inline sixes, engines where the seals are BIG and it's easy to get to them with a huge crowbar sized seal puller.

Much harder job on a Honda transverse four! A big puller is hard to maneuver, and I don't have one here. I have some curved picks and hooks, and I've been working on all three seals carefully.

The hooks keep tearing through the seal surface without getting any traction. Don't want to work them in too deep, while I'm trying not to scratch the shaft or the seal bore.

I figure that for the cam seal, the trick might be to detorque the cam bearing caps in the proper order, and then when they are all pretty loose, take off the cap on the sprocket end. That looks like it gives access to half the seal. That and a pair of channel locks and it should come out. Looks that way, at least.

The balance shaft and main seal, well, uh, no such easy way.

 

If this is for an Accord (you mentioned balance shaft) then I would get in touch with your local Honda service guy about the updated retainer to hold the Balance shaft seal in place. Sometimes they will leak or even pop out and lose all your oil before you know it. For the cam seals, pop off the end cam caps and you should be able to get the seals out and the new ones in. Don't overtighten the caps or the bolts WILL break. I believe it is only 11-13 ft-lbs or so off the top of my head, check your manual. If you pull the balance shaft gear off the side with the gear reduction iron case to replace the case seal, make SURE you have the gear lined up correctly or the engine will vibrate like crazy. If you put the engine to TDC first and don't move the crank, you should be ok with all that. BTW only way I have ever replace the other balance shaft seal and crank seals is with the oil pump off.

 

Great comment, rev. I should have mentioned that just for anybody else doing the same job. Yes, this particular motor has the balance shaft seal retainer installed. Honda did it as a free job as part of the silent recall at 70K.

Their version is a single bolt bracket that comes in from the left and covers about 40% of the arc of the seal. There is an aftermarket one from Sure Seal that bolts in from above with two bolts and covers more of the seal. It looks more solid to me. If I were paying for the part, I'd use the Sure Seal version.

Insanely enough, the wrench and service advisor at the local dealership said that they only get .5 hour from Honda for the balance shaft retainer, which is not enough time for them to pull off all of the covers.

They take off ONLY the upper cover. I looked at that when I had only the upper cover off, and I can see no way even with exotic flex tools to put that retainer on. They must have some serious mech mojo workin'.



Roger that, rev. I have a low scale torque wrench handy. Do you open up only the end caps? I have been told (in Honda motorcycle engine work) never to let a cam get stressed asymmetrically. All caps are supposed to be torqued down and up at the same time, no more than 1 ft-lb or 1/4 turn per bolt, until the cam is loose or tight. Haynes says something similar about the Accord car engine (I don't have my book in front of me).

D'oh! Sounds like a really steep job. I am going to go try to find a mini seal puller (my pick and hook set is defeated) to do it from the front.

 

Another tip on those balance shafts is to take out the bolt with the 12mm head on either side of the block towards the front that looks like some kind of drain plug with an aluminum washer/gasket. You should be able to slide a #2 phillips in that hole and it goes into a hole in the balance shaft to make sure you have it lined up correctly when assembling.

 

Yep, rev, got that trick too. Thanks, though!

Latest update on seals: I got the cam seal done. It required having to unbolt the entire rocker arm assembly in order to lift up that and the cam.

The old seal came out trivially. The new one took some work to get in properly! Lots of clean engine oil and some very careful nudging finally put it in place.

Note to anyone else doing this job: check CAREFULLY when you're done. I looked at my first pass fitting the seal and said, "I am one bad-ass wrench." Then I remembered that every time I have thought that, it's been right before a disaster.

I went and got a mirror and penlight and looked at the seal *under* the cam, where you can't see it directly. One inside edge was folded and everted. If I had assembled and run like that, the cam would have leaked oil onto the timing belt. I fixed it and remembered to always do a humility check.

Be careful with your retorquing of the rocker assembly, too. Specific order, not too much torque on any one bolt at any time. See your shop manual.

Now I'm taking apart the WHOLE FRIGGING BOTTOM OF THE MOTOR to get the balance shaft and crank seals out. If I ever catch the wanker who designed this thing, I'll smash him in the teeth with my biggest torque wrench.

In order to get to the seals from behind, the oil pump mount plate has to come off. OK, sure. Easy. No, wait, it's not. Damnit, there are studs that go into the far edge of the oil pan. Start pulling the pan. No, wait, there are two bolt heads on the far end of the pan that are hidden behind the flywheel inspect cover. Start to take off the flywheel cover. No, wait, the flywheel cover has a flange that sticks under the trans linkage connect cover, so there's *another* cover to come off. Get all that done and, no, wait, realize that the oil pan has to be fully dropped, not just down two inches. Which now means taking off the center structural member and the exhaust.

INCREDIBLE!

It's one huge 3D mechanical puzzle. And no real reason for it. Any maintenance engineer with a year of experience could have shown them how to do this much more simply. I am just going to go get the grease off my hands and start drinking and try to forget the horror.

 

"If I ever catch the wanker who designed this thing, I'll smash him in the teeth with my biggest torque wrench. "

No, no, you're wrong, it's spelled Wankel and he designed the ROTARY engine...

...but that is a story for another day, grasshopper.


hehehe