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Keyla,
Here is an old rennlist post from Walt Fricke ("The Professor")...
1) release the shift coupler by loosening the rear setscrew. the coupler
is below the plate with 4 sheet metal screws you need to remove to get
to it on top of the shift tunnel between where the rear passengers' feet
would be if ever anyone rode back there. This is a precaution, and
when you put it back it will be just as before.
2)Take loose the connector on the wire loom which connects the rear of
the engine to the relay etc panel on the left rear of the engine bay. Also
loosen the greasy and oily oil breather hose which connects the engine
to the oil filler/dipstick assembly - you can do this at the filler area (the
engine breather line you couldn't release from its other end if your life
depended on it). And the hose which connects the air filter area of the
air box to this oil filler area.
By the way, if you overfill your oil tank, the overflow goes through this
line into the air box, and then out a drain on the front (transmission) side
of the engine right next to the oil cooler you suspect of leaking. Oil
coming out of this drain will look a lot like oil coming out of a leak in the
cooler, and is a likely culprit for a lot of dirty oily guck in that lower part of
your engine's world.
3) Put your jack under the rear of the engine and jack it up until the rear
tires are off the ground. Put jack stands under the rear using the ends of
the torsion bars at the spring plates and lower the car until it is just about
to rest on the jack stands completely. Remove the right rear tire (since
you are getting at the oil cooler).
4) remove the two rear engine mount bolts over at the sides of the
engine compartment.
5) watching all other lines, wires, and so on which connect the engine to
the rest of the car, lower slowly. When anything looks like it is getting
tight or is going to get tight, stop. Don't come down too far, you just want
some reaching and looking room over the air box and fuel distributor
area, and you will get a bit more of that when you remove the rubber
boot connecting the throttle body to the fuel distributor.
In your case you have already drained your oil and removed the oil line
connecting the sump tank to the engine via the bottom of the oil cooler.
It's been a while since I did this, so watch things closely. The engine
scavange oil line to the external oil thermostat should have enough flex
for this, but you may want to disconnect it also. And it isn't hard to
disconnect the two fuel lines. The efficiency of this sort of tilt lowering
comes in not having to remove the CV s and the sway bar and the
tranny mount bolts and the heater hoses from the heat exchangers to the
valves, and the accelerator rod .
6) as a precaution, put some sort of wood blocks under the engine at
this point to back up your jack (I once had a jack slowly lower the
engine/tranny assembly over night, even though I thought I had tightened
the release mechanism).
This will give you enough room to inspect the idiot light sender area and
to replace the sender on general principles. If it is original it might indeed
be leaking after 18 years. However, it is near the breather exit and that
area seems always to have stray oil.
Once you do this you will see that it is easy enough that if you are not
losing much oil you might want to just clean things up some and replace
the oil warning sender and put everything back in order and see if your
leak has stopped. However, you should have enough clearance to get
at the oil cooler cover bolts, and, when you get that off, the two top bolts
which hold it on so you can remove it for inspection and pressure testing
if it shows signs of leaking as you set out to do.
I've never had (knock on wood) a cooler leak. The seals are pretty
durable (they are captured nicely and really shouldn't fail). You'd think a
small leak in the cooler would grow into a large one quickly with all that
oil pressure, but maybe they don't. I had a small leak in a VW cooler
once, and was certainly happy it was small as it happened in the middle
of a leg of the Carrera Panamericana and by adding oil I was able to
finish the day before I had to replace the cooler. However, it was pretty
unmistakable as a cooler leak because it got oil to places a drip type leak
couldn't have done.
The discerning reader will notice that this general procedure of rotating
the engine/tranny unit down using the compliance of the rubber in the
tranny mounts is the same as the procedure you can use to remove the
entire engine without having to remove the tranny also. Except you don't
have to remove quite as many fuel lines and such, and needn't jack the
car up as far.
Good luck.
Walt Fricke
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