asianguido

Hope someone can help w/ this.
To replace the clutch, I had to take out and put back in both driveaxles. The passenger side was fine but there was a leak coming from the driver side driveaxle where it enters the the manual transmission. I replaced the driveaxle seal (from Kohlweiss @ $5) but it leaked again. I replace it again (from Honda @ $12) and it leaked again. It's a small puddle overnight and the first time around, it leaked right away and this second time around, the leak started only after the 3rd day (about 70 miles of driving). I installed the seal very gently using two rubber mallets, one of which was the perfect size of the seal so pressing against the seal and the other to tap the first mallet with. I greased the outer circumferance and tapped *very* gently. It went in pretty much as far as it could go in as far as I could tell. The "open" end of the seal went into the transmission... ie, if a cross-section of the seal is like a "C", then the hole of the "C" went into the transmission sid and the back part of the "C" was facing the outside.
My questions:
1) do I need a special tool to insert this seal?
2) did I insert the seal in the wrong direction?
3) based on some other threads on this topic, it sounds like I may have inserted it too far in... how can I tell if it went in too far (or not too far in)?
Please help b/c it's a big hassel taking that driveaxle out and I want to make sure it's done right the next time. Also, if you know of any other possibilities (I'm 99% sure it's the seal and not any crack) for this leak, please let me know. The original seal looked OK when I took it out and I'm not sure why this all started after I only took the driveaxle out/in (was fine before this whole project started) so am very confused.

jpciii

did you get *ALL* of the old seal removed?

asianguido

Definitely got all of the old seal removed. It came out in one piece.

asianguido

Some of the other posts for this type of problem ask if I overfilled the transmission oil... would anyone know how this would matter? I would think it's a completely enclosed thing. I did probably overfill a bit wondering how this would matter. Thanks and anyone who helps, double thanks!

bcmike

A loose bearing that would allow the cv joint to rotate in a oblong path maybe??

fireant

Start with a square of wood the size of the seal to get it flush, then use the old seal with the wood over it to tap it in farther. Be patient... dont let one part get more than 1mm deeper than the other parts.

asianguido

I wanted to update this post w/ the resolution. The problem was that I was putting the oil seal too far in! It's deceptive b/c there's a natural stop for the oil seal (which is too far in) so I pushed it in till it stopped but this caused all the leaks. The rule is PUT THE OIL SEAL TILL IT'S FLUSH WITH THE CASING OF THE TRANSMISSION OPENING, ONLY. Another good practice is while the driveaxle is out of the car, slide the oil seal on to see how it's suppose to make contact w/ the fat part of the driveaxle. This will give you some approximation on how much the oil seal is suppose to go in (b/c the fat part is right next to the casing of the transmission opening). After this was done, NO LEAK WHATSOEVER!!!
Thanks everyone for their input.