Does anyone know how you pull the reservoir off the pump? I took off the 2 hex head screws on the back, but the pump is not coming off and I don't see what else could be holding it on. Maybe I just have to hammer it out or press on it?

 

The thing the high-pressure line screws into, the pressure relief valve, has to come out too. It just unscrews.

No hammering required on anything. Look up on rockauto.com or wherever, what a pump looks like, and what a reservoir looks like; you'll see that the reservoir is just a sheet metal can, and the pump is a round cast (forged? iunno) object with a big O-ring around it, that just slips down into the can.

 

Thanks I eventually just got another one with a reservoir since it was only 10 dollars more. I got everything put in and cleaned up and then I found another leak:

So I guess either the cam sensor wasn't leaking, which seems unlikely since this leak appears smaller than what it was, or either it was leaking from the cam sensor and another location. I am going to have to get some UV dye, or either give up on trying to fix leaks.

 

So, I don't think my leak was ever fixed. I think I thought I fixed it because I wiped it off and I didn't see it again, but in reality I may have just slowed the leak down:


This spot popped up on the oil cooler, which is the same spot the oil was concentrating before. I think I am going to have to pull the intake manifold again and pull the cam sensor out and look at the o-ring again. Maybe it got damaged or cut when I was pushing the new cam sensor in? I mean it didn't just slide in there, I had to really push on it to get it in there fully seated. Maybe I need to buy a AC Delco one, visually the O-rings looked about the same size from my original to the new aftermarket replacement one, but the aftermarket replacement one was considerably harder.

I guess there is no way the bore can get worn or damaged on the block? With as much oil around it I don't see how it could have cut or damaged the oring when installing it. I think water from the cowl drips down right on that area, I wonder if rust or something has something to do with the reason these cam sensors leak, I know the bore it goes it was extremely rusty looking, looked like rusty oilly mess looking down at the cam sensor bore.

 

I have had a lot of problems with my oil cooler leaking too. I havent solved it yet, but my word of caution: dont over tighten it, you will pull the threads right out of the pan. M6x1.0 if you need to helicoil it (I did mine)

My oil cooler leak looks almost exactly like that. I use Fel-Pro, ACDelco, Chinesium, RTV: always has that drip

 

Thanks, I did tighten up just a little on those 2 bolts holding the oil cooler port thing on, hopefully I didn't go to tight on them. I feel if the source of the leak was actually the oil cooler, it wouldn't be leaking at the very bottom of the bellhousing. Unless of course there are 2 different leak sources I guess. I don't think it could be a rear main seal either, since it seems like you would have to have bad crank bearings or a broken crank or something like that to make the seal leak, but given that it seems to only leak when the engine is running makes me think it might still be a rear main seal.

 

So I put a bottle of UV dye in it and drove it around for about 15 min or so. I see no UV dye under the truck, so I pulled the intake manifold off again and see no UV dye at the back where the cam and oil pressure sensor is. I take out the cam sensor, and it appears there is no leakage from the new aftermarket cam sensor that I can tell:

I guess the only thing I can do now is keep driving and see if I can spot where the UV dye comes out first. I would imagine the ratio of dye to oil is enough to where large leaks would show up more clearly than oil thats already dripped out thats just getting on other things since this could throw you off. It says to add the whole bottle for 5 quarts of oil and thats what I did. I guess I may just need to drive it longer for the leak to show itself.

 

Probably need to go longer.

An easy way to tell if you have enough dye is pull the dipstick and look at it with your light and lenses and see what the current oil actually looks like and compare to what you're seeing under the truck.

Let us know what you find man

 

Also is the back of the flex plate clean? If so it likely isn't a rear main seal.

The rear main seal plates can leak too.

But what I found most often is leaky oil pan gaskets, outside of the cam sensor. I would say oil pan gaskets are most common, followed by cam sensor, then rear main stuff.

My first LS motor was my 2000 Camaro SS. I pulled the trans twice for a leak at the rear (just like in your picture, leaking in the center at the rear between bellhousing and engine) and the leak stayed the same. Ended up being the oil pan gasket.

If the leak is coming from up high (cam sensor, oil sender etc) it will usually show on the sides of the block and in the starter and on the black plastic close out things that go around the starter and the hole on the other side of the engine that is in the same spot of the starter (on the opposite side) because of the block and rear main plate design, if it's dead center like in your picture it's usually rear main, rear main plate, or oil pan gasket.

you can see what I'm talking about in the pic, anything above the rear main plate will get diverted off to the sides and come down the sides, but will also appear in the center since it all kinda moves around. But if it's rear main or oil pan you're likely to only see it in the center ish.. None of it is proof but gives you an idea of what is going on.

 

[QUOTE=00pooterSS;5492735]Also is the back of the flex plate clean? If so it likely isn't a rear main seal.

The rear main seal plates can leak too.

But what I found most often is leaky oil pan gaskets, outside of the cam sensor. I would say oil pan gaskets are most common, followed by cam sensor, then rear main stuff.

My first LS motor was my 2000 Camaro SS. I pulled the trans twice for a leak at the rear (just like in your picture, leaking in the center at the rear between bellhousing and engine) and the leak stayed the same. Ended up being the oil pan gasket.

If the leak is coming from up high (cam sensor, oil sender etc) it will usually show on the sides of the block and in the starter and on the black plastic close out things that go around the starter and the hole on the other side of the engine that is in the same spot of the starter (on the opposite side) because of the block and rear main plate design, if it's dead center like in your picture it's usually rear main, rear main plate, or oil pan gasket.

you can see what I'm talking about in the pic, anything above the rear main plate will get diverted off to the sides and come down the sides, but will also appear in the center since it all kinda moves around. But if it's rear main or oil pan you're likely to only see it in the center ish.. None of it is proof but gives you an idea of what is going on.

/QUOTE]
Thanks for the help again, and I'm with you I am thinking oil pan.

If you look at this picture you can see that both oil pan bolts have oil around them and oil seems to be concentrated at the crease between the block and oil pan. Up above there is absolutely no oil. I have to believe that the cam sensor was in fact leaking and I guess I have probably fixed that leak, enough to where I don't have overnight drops of oil on the ground.

The oil pan leak theory gets kind of challenged when you look above the oil pan to block crease and see a little wetness from oil but its not that much.

I would think I can drop the oil pan without taking the front axel out? Look like I can just take the skid plate off and unbolt it? Or is it not that easy?

Also the flexplate is completely dry, its hard to get a good view but you can see a little oil inside there, I also pryed the black plastic cover below the starter off some and looked at the back of the flexplate and its completely dry:


I am not impressed at all with this UV dye stuff. I just don't understand how its supposed to help you pinpoint a leak any better when I can see leaking oil with my own eyes. It would help if maybe it would only illuminate under the light when its at a high concentration or something so you could see where the sources and heavy spots were more easily. I did compare what I was seeing, by looking at a sample on the dipstick, so the sample on the dipstick looks like same color looking through the glasses as the concentrated spot on the oil cooler in the picture and the spot on the bottom of the bellhousing.