replacing my timing cover seal and oil pan
 

Has any of you done this before? I an not a mechanic but I believe I am mechanically inclined to take care of this (with the help of google and YouTube of course)

Any horror stories or success stories?

What truck do you have (K5 Blazer or S10 Blazer)? The procedure can vary between the two. I don't know much about K5 Blazers, but I can tell you that it's going to take some time and tools. With the 2 wheel drive S10 Blazers your going to have to remove the engine to replace the oil pan gasket (I believe with the 4WD blazers you can get away with just removing the front differential) and your going all the tools needed to pull an engine out of the truck; most auto part store will let you rent some of the tools needed for this.

If your going to replace the timing cover seal, get a new timing cover (they vary from $20-$50) and they come with a new front crankshaft seal and should have a timing cover gasket. Also, if your engine has over 100,000 miles on it go ahead and get a harmonic balancer; even get the old off with out breaking it a new harmonic balancer is safe way to assure that won't run the risk of the old one breaking and then snapping your crankshaft in half (you don't have to if you didn't break the old balancer, but I personally wouldn't trust a balancer with over 100,000 miles on it).

Finally you'll need a torque wrench and a repair manual. A calibrated torque wrench will allow for perfect seal and repair manual will tell you exactly what you need to do.

It actually ended up being a loose connection between my oil cooling line and my radiator. The oil pan gasket and the timing cover gasket are fine, go figure. Most likely will no longer be visiting the auto shop that told me I needed to replace them.

Thank you for the response.

Sorry to say it but harmonic balancers last was longer than 100,000 miles.If the harmonic balancer has a lip or groove in it?You can buy a sleeve for it.Taking off a harmonic balancer your self is alot of time and effert,Paying someone else to do it will cost you.I had an 81 chevy malibu that had the 5.7 liter 350 in her.She had alot of room to work with.But as far as the second generations s-10/blazzers.Forget about it.You have to take so much **** off just to get to the timing cover and harmon balancer.That`s why it cost so much to work on them.