Td5 D2 engine - Front Camshaft Seal.

This is a common problem on the Td5 engine and the  removal and replacement is well documented over many sites on the web.

Hx has been suffering from this for many years. I bought the replacement seal some time ago but only now have got around to doing it on the back of by-passing the exhaust cooler...

The Camshaft Front Oil Seal is a large 7 cm plastic plug fitted with a thick rubber 'o-ring' seal for a tight interference fit. Over time the rubber o-ring will perish and lose its radius and then engine oil can get past and dribble out and down the cylinder head and gunk everything up!

The congealed leaky oil can easily be seen below the seal in the above photos.

Removal begins by first undoing the two 8 mm bolts that secure the nearby electrical harness either side of the fitted seal to gain better access.

Hx is a 15P Td5 so it is fitted with an exhaust cooler mounted just below the seal location. It is possible to remove the seal with the cooler still in place. My recent work to by-pass the exhaust cooler meant that the hoses for the cooler are now removed so access to the seal is easier.

I cleaned up as much of the gunk from around the failed seal as I could. Be careful not to dislodge bits of the oily gunk onto the belt pulleys which are nearby.

Removal of the failed seal was easy. It was not a tight fit (which indicates a poor performing seal) and it was possible to winkle it out with my fingers.

I was a bit surprised at the size of the 'air-gap' between the end of the camshaft and the casing of the cylinder head. I guess I was expecting some sort of oilway to be right behind the seal ..?

I cleaned up the mounting face and then smeared clean engine oil onto the new seal and the seal housing in the cylinder head.

The new seal was carefully positioned square on to the head and then initially 'popped' by hand into its aperture. 

I was relieved at how tight it was going in. I used a suitable metal strip to winkle the new seal fully home using the body of the exhaust cooler as a lever/fulcrum.

This was a simple 10 min job. Yet it took me 4 years to get around to do it!!

Two photos above show the removed seal after cleaning up. The thick O-ring can clearly be seen to have lost its radius and worn 'flat'.