rear main seal

[theorie]

I just replaced the rear main on my FD. It's the same part for all RX-7 engines, however not all main seals are created equally, as I've recently found.

I built my motor with a rebuild kit from Atkins and used the rear main that came with it. It was kind of a brownish color. That seal turned out to be defective, and came loose after only a couple thousand miles (I had the same problem, oil coming out of the bell housing). I ordered a replacement from Atkins, but before I installed it looked around for alternatives. I ended up getting one from Mike Lowe at Lowe's Automotive in Sarasota, FL. The seal I got from him was about the same price but seems a bit better quality and more "heavy duty", in my opinion. Installed that seal and haven't had any problems yet, but it's only been a few hundred miles since then.

Here are some photos showing the comparison between the Atkins seal (on the left) vs the seal I got from Mike Lowe (on the right):





Took me about 6 hours start to finish, and I was using a lift. Also, it's a hell of a lot easier to drain the transmission first, just FYI. If you want to go with the Atkins seal, I have a brand-new-in-bag one that I didn't use. Shoot me a PM. If you want the other kind, I'm not sure where to get it, but you could always call Mike Lowe and ask, here's his website: http://www.lowesautorepairsarasota.com