Thanks for doing this video. I need to drop the transmission to access the water outlet gaskets that are leaking. I tried doing it from the top taking manifolds off but I couldn't get the torque needed to stop the leaking. Taking this transmission down is no joke and I'm confident that you saved me a ton of time, headaches, and aggravation. Thanks man-really easy to follow and understand. You did an awesome job!
First of all, mega thanks for putting up this video! This helped a lot when I had to tackle my rear main seal job. I referenced this vid several times before tackling this job myself. This was my first time dealing with an automatic transmission (i.e. flex plate, torque converter, etc.) and 4x4 with transfer case, front axle, front diff. I am a professional mechanic technician, so this kinda job doesn't intimidate me - if I had the right tools, I'd be fine. Some tips: 1) You don't need to pull the seats - you can get to the rear bottom bolts of the center console by sliding both seats all the way forward; to get at everything else, slide the seats all the way back. 2) Your LE is rather rare - I have an '01 SE that has the shifter 4x4 linkage (I think the XE base model is like this too?) on the side (with the auto trans), which is easier to remove with the exception of on pass-through wiring harness (white plastic base with two locating "feet" with black metal cover) that goes into the passenger side of the trans case. I think this is for all the solenoids, and I didn't figure out how to disconnect it so I just left it - it was just enough slack to nudge to trans + transfer case to the side to access the rear main seal. The 4x4 shifter lever does get in the way on reinstallation, but dropping the two 12mm(?) bolts for the shifter assembly helped a lot. I think unplugging electrical wiring harness plugs is a little bit easier and less stuff to do. You are going to tear the bottom / inner rubber boot - that's just the rubber getting hard over time, and it catches on the bottom of the shift lever - just tear it off. 3) I was able to just move the trans + transfer case nudged over to the passenger side to be able to fully access the rear main seal. This was with is sitting on the trans jack. 4) Dropping the back half of the stock exhaust wasn't too bad - with the exception of the 14mm(?) nuts (one pair for each side) that held the exhaust pipes to the left and right cats, the rest of the exhaust was held with 4 or 5 pairs of 12mm head bolts that held the hangers in place. I did not cut anything, and it went back in relatively easy - the exhaust does loop over the rear axle, so this keeps it from crashing down. 5) Those bolts + nuts on the driveshafts (both front and rear) are a PAIN to remove! I disconnected the main driveshaft from the rear diff and left it inserted in the back of the transfer case output to keep fluid from leaking back there. 6) Getting the torque converter bolts to line up was another PAIN! I first bolted the bell housings bolts, thinking I could spin either the torque converter itself or the flex plate (engine side) - NOPE! Once it's in, both spin together - I had to back out the bell housing about an inch, lined up one torque converter bolt (with the use of a pin punch) and then bolt everything back. 7) It's not real obvious, but ATF is refilled through the dipstick tube. The FSM mentions "charge pipe," but it's buried on what this exactly is. Lucky I had a MityVac manual fluid pump that made this a breeze. I first tried to not spill any fluid, but that was impossible after removing the two 19mm banjo bolts on each side of the trans case that goes to the cooler up front, and the speedo gear at the back of the transfer case. FSM mentioned Nissan fluid "D" but Mercon III compatible ATF is listed as an equivalent; the original Nissan "D" fluid is brown in color - like engine oil but without the burnt smell. In the end, I calculate about 30 hours of my time from start to finish, by myself. For those going after the rear main seal, here's more tips: 1) Upon reinstallation, but the two locating dowels on each side - no other UTube vid mentions this, and it give you another 1mm to work with. The dowels come loose with vice grips. 2) Oil the circular oil seal. Work the seal in with a small screwdriver - pay particular attention on how the oil ring seal goes in, as it's has an inner lip! Keep using the screwdriver to gentle prod the lip seal at the bottom - be patient, this take a while. Once everything looks kosher, get the three 10mm head bolts to thread most of the way in. THEN, tap the two dowels in with a pin punch - take you're time; the dowels have a bevel / chamfer that will guide the rear main seal aluminum housing downward. You will see it close the gap. 3) When I removed the original Nissan real main seal (housing), there was no paper gasket, as the Fel-Pro kits comes with one - I didn't use this gasket; the Fel-Pro rear main seal aluminum housing has grooves like the Nissan one does that keep RTV in. I also noticed that Nissan did not RTV the lip seal either - I did use a little to keep the lip seal held against the underside of the rear main seal aluminum housing, but no RTV under that in contact with the engine (upper oil pan). You see a lot of other UTube vids where they smear RTV all over the place and make a mess! If Nissan didn't do it, it's not necessary.
Yikes. Time to bust out the soldering iron. I actually cut the wires at the junkyard on the donor trans. I rectified the situation by soldering all 22 little wires back together. I recommend going to the junkyard and cutting a longer donor section of wire harness to splice into the mistake if your junkyard has another donor. Just make sure the donor harness has the same plugs and wire count. Speaking from experience 2002,2003,2004 are all the same harness
Thank you so much for this vid, i had a couple of question and you addressed them, now I'm having so much trouble putting it back i removed it to replace the rear main seal and for some reason I'm not getting the transmission to aligng...so frustrating...not sure what's wrong with it, when i finally got it in i started it and made some weird noise and I turned it off immediately!!
Thanks for the awesome video! Do you know anything about the vg33e transmission? I've got a 97 QX4, and the transmission recently started having issues with delayed shifting from 1st to 2nd. I'm about to replace the speed sensor, but I'm hoping this isn't a sign that the transmission is going out.
The vg33 re4r01a trans in the vg33 models is supposed to be very similar to the vq35de variants but unfortunately I don't have any knowledge about troubleshooting or fixing them
Is it essential separate the transfer case in order to drop the transmission? I'm trying to replace the rear main seal and yes I did watch your video about the lower oil pan gasket. Thank you for that! The unfortunate news is that I just got done replacing the upper oil pan gasket and now I'm going to have to take it all apart again to get to the rear main seal
That sucks to hear man. But no, you don’t have to separate the transfer case. I did it because it would be lighter to take it apart in pieces using that flimsy transmission jack.
Where is the test port so I can add an oil temp probe? Is it that similarly sized port just to the bottom-left of what you refer to as the "dipstick hole" at 1:17:02? Just saw at 40:34 that's actually a cooler line with a banjo bolt. Where is that freaking test port?!
That banjo bolt is the test port somehow. According the 2001 r50 fsm on page At-62 it shows that a couple different tests are done for line pressure using those ports that banjo bolts connect to.
@@dospathsgarage2854 Actually I just found some sources showing where at least the "Reverse/3-4/N" pressure test port is. Its on the driver side and it is its own port, I won't post the link because I think RU-vid will block my comment if I do. Its on ClubFrontier. Still can't get a view of the passenger side to find the "Drive/1-2" pressure test port. I think it should be on the passenger side just above the oil pan and just before the tail shaft housing. Also I happened to see one of your other vids for the main timing chain tensioner rattling and you talk about using 5 quarts. What exactly did you do to fix that issue because I have a rattle at a certain rpm and for the longest time have thought it was exhaust shield rattle but cant find any shields that are loose.
@@on1ytheb3st I think I have a half million photos of my transmission project somewhere. I'll see if I can find an image that may show where the test ports would be. I'll let you know if I find anything worthwhile. For the video with the timing chain tensioner, the context of that video was when I had let the vehicle sit for a couple weeks and installed a new OEM tensioner because I was replacing some other damaged components inside the timing case. When retiming with a new tensioner, the chain would alternated between going slack and tight while cranking by hand. I set up the camera to film while I started cranking with the starter to see what was going on. I think it just had to fill up with oil. After that, the tensioner would only make noise if I parked it for weeks at a time at an incline, but after idling for 3-5 seconds it would get quiet again. Never heard a noise during normal use
@@dospathsgarage2854 Thanks man would love to see whatever you can find. I'm starting to rethink using the pressure ports though because apparently the fluid in the pan will be most accurate so I might do a drain plug sensor (does worry me about things hanging lower than factory since drain plug is on the bottom of the pan). Looks like you took off the entire timing cover for that job; were you getting a rattling prior to breaking everything apart? I'm thinking it would probably be productive to just go ahead and replace my main timing chain tensioner (same one you replaced) through that access port from your video; pretty sure Nissan made a rolling update to them for the VQs or something so that could possibly be why I'm getting a rattle. Hope its not a broken chain guide and it is just one of my exhaust shields rattling. Also if you look at the FSM for the Water pump replacement using the access ports, it recommends revving the engine in Park to I think 3,000rpm for a solid 30 seconds or so to get oil up and to the tensioner since it's hydraulic. Also people say pre-priming the tensioner before installation is always good practice. Was it hard getting the tensioner in there?
@@on1ytheb3st pan readings should be pretty accurate. Honestly temp readings at driver side trans fluid hose behind the radiator shouldn't be too far off pan temps. Those pumps push oil through pretty quick so I don't even think there's even 1 second delay from the oil coming out of the trans before it gets up there by the radiator. (I broke a trans cooler line and it sprayed all the oil out to empty in less than 50 feet of driving, just cruising in 4low). I did have the pan off of a 2001 I used to own. It was a cheap project I bought that had a broken exhaust cam chain and broken exhaust cam chain tensioner. I threw in a new water pump, new main chain tensioner, new exhaust cam chain and its tensioner. Didn't bother pre-priming it like I should have so I had to figure out why it wasn't taking the chain slack out until it had oil pressure. Nissan fsm will also tell you to do the 3k rpm thing with just about anything coolant related to ensure air pockets im the coolant get pushed through
So I didn't measure them with any tools or try bolting them up to the transfer case, but visually looking at them side by side, I couldn't find any bolt pattern differences for atx14a and tx10. Only thing that messed me up was the casting features on the side of the tail shaft house for linkage/actuators being different
