3205 Rear Main Seal

[jsoluna]

A while back I resealed the front cover and installed a new water pump and front main seal on the Kawasaki FD620D. Not long after that, I developed a major oil leak at the rear of the engine. With the radiator and shrouding in place, it was difficult to tell exactly where it was coming from (as most crank seals can be) but I figured that it made sense that I had disturbed mounting of the crankshaft by removing it's front support and thus comprised the already marginal sealing of the original rear main seal.

After doing some ground engaging work and pushing brush piles around last week, I had sheared the fan blades on my hydro pump fan (skid plate coming soon!)

Since I had to remove the driveshaft I figured it was time to take the plunge and fix the oil leak as well.

It was insanely packed with oil and debris. It's surprising that it was charging and firing as well as it was with all the buildup on the ignition pulse coils and charging coil. A simple attack with brake clean didn't suffice so I had to pressure wash it. Of course, today the outside temps have dropped to half of what they were yesterday (thanks, Ohio!).

I just got the old seal out and it is certainly shot. Hard as a rock. Excited to get the Kawi back together and wanted to share some teardown pics. It can be done with the engine in the frame, it requires removing the radiator, coolant tank, fan shroud, lower shroud, and starter, and charging coil. I also removed the radiator fan to make access from the top down easier.

1500 hours and still going strong! These are some amazing engines. Crank is still nice and tight. Previous owner was terrible with maintenance. I bought it with an overheated engine and blown trans with no bearings left in the axles and a split carrier. Engine is still all original internals.