1999 Mercury Sable rear main seal

TERRIB10

MEMBER
1999 MERCURY SABLE
V8
FWD
AUTOMATIC
69,130 MILES

Hi this car is well maintained, new tires, new front struts, but smelt oil burning other day. Mechanic, who is very trustworthy, says oil leak -- rear main seal but very labor intensive to pull out transmission to get at it. I'm wondering is it worth fixing? We suspected an oil leak about 10 months ago and didn't try to fix it, but it is consuming alot of oil. Everyone loves this model/year and I'm always told to keep it going cause the car runs great. I'm wondering at what point do you stop throwing money into it and buy a new car? $2k to fix oil leak and rear struts too and a couple of hoses. 8 hour labor to pull transmission out to get at rear main seal. Any danger in pulling out transmission?

1 Reply

SATURNTECH9

MECHANIC
30,869 POSTS

First of all thank you so much for your donation. If your car is consuming a lot of oil I don't know that it is worth 2,000 to fix it. That would be up to you if it was me I wouldn't put 2,000 in a car like that consuming a lot of oil. Then the next thing you would have to worry about is the transmission if it were to go out then that would be a lot money to fix it again. Plus it's already consuming a lot of oil on the engine. When you ask is there any danger in removing the transmission are you asking because you are thinking about doing the job yourself?