ST202 Celica 3SGE oil leak...rear main or ???

[SubbyRS]

Hi guys,

Newbie forum member, hoping you can help me out....

Background: car is a dead stock Celica SSII auto, so has the 3SGE with A140E transmission. We've owned it for 4 years and never had any probs whatsoever until yesterday......

Backed it out of the garage and discovered 3-4 teaspoons of engine oil had leaked out from somewhere......damn I thought....

Peered up underneath and found the following (excuse pics quality);







Does this look familiar to you guys? the leaking is pretty much localised to what you see in the pics, as you can see the oil has travelled up & down the engine mount crossmember thingy.

There's no oil leaking down the back of the head/block, and no oil leaking from the dizzy so I'm thinking either leaking sump or leaking rear mail seal....any definite thoughts/ideas??

The local dealer "wasn't too sure" and quoted AUD$140 to replace the sump gasket (is there one??), but said it would be around AUD$700 if it's a rear main seal. Now that sounds absolutely ridiculous given the cost of seal kits - is he off his head??

As an aside, the ST202 Celica never had the 3SGE here in Auz (much like the States) but the MR2 did....so it's not like the Toyota dealers will be unfamiliar with the motor.....

Is the Celica 3SGE much different from the MR2 3SGE?? they're both transverse so I guess not...?

Hoping you can shed some light on this for me, I had a good look around but couldn't really find what I need to know.

Cheers all
Rob

[RomanV]

The reason the rear main seal is expensive to replace is for the labour...

it's an engine/gbox out job.

[SubbyRS]

Thanks RomanV, I realise it's an involved job, but $700 is like 10-12 hours labour!!! surely it doesn't take that long
(disclaimer: I have few to no clues about 3SGE's, I'm a turbo Subaru man )

[Adydas]

it took me about 2-3 hours to get my engine back into the car, so if you add up labour to do the work and take it out before hand i dont feel 7 hours to be totaly unfair.

[sergei]

To replace rear main seal you don't need to take the engine out, just the gearbox, with auto it should just go straight down once you remove crossmember, box mounts, other crap in the way and undo bolts on box and on flexi plates.. it should be about 4 hour job. From picture oil looks reddish, maybe it is transmission fluid leaking?

[SubbyRS]

Couple of new pics taken an hour ago I undid the engine crossmemer to get a better view.

Q: if the main seal has gone, should I expect the ring gear to be splashed with oil?? it looks clean, but there's a small pool (poolette?) at the bottom, you can see it in the mirror...

[TRDGT4]

check up the back of the engine as well you could find that the rocker cover is leaking and running down the back of the engine but in my experience these celicas do develop this problem over time but don't just think its the rear main it could be the sump. clean it off and go for a drive to confrim