[s-cars] How hard to replace oil pump seals?

[Dave Ellis]

Hi All!

My '93 S4 has developed an oil leak from the bottom front of the engine.  
I've tracked it down to coming from in and around the oil pump and 
suspect either the oil pump gasket or nearby seal has gone south on me.  

I've not yet had to change the timing belt since I got the car, so I'm 
not very familiar yet with this area of the engine.  I was unable to 
see precisely where the oil is leaking from without removing the timing 
belt etc. since it's partially covered by the rear timing belt plastic 
shield.

Does anyone know if it's more likely that a shaft seal or a gasket has 
let go?  Has anyone run into this problem before?

How hard is it to change the oil pump gasket?  What about the shaft seal 
that goes through the pump?  It appears the timing belt and 
paraphenalia must be removed to do this.  Any way to get around having 
to do that?  The timing belt has only 21000km on it so far.  Anyone 
have a BTDT for this?

Lots of questions!   :o)

I took some photos of the oil leaking from the around the oil pump area.  

Here's looking down the passneger side of the engine with the camera 
just above the TBV:
http://mimir.dyndns.org:8080/images/camera/Dave/08-04-2004/IMG_1872.JPG_index.html
http://mimir.dyndns.org:8080/images/camera/Dave/08-04-2004/IMG_1874.JPG_index.html

And here's the same view from the front of the engine looking down to 
the bottom of the timing belt and oil pump:
http://mimir.dyndns.org:8080/images/camera/Dave/08-04-2004/IMG_1870.JPG_index.html
http://mimir.dyndns.org:8080/images/camera/Dave/08-04-2004/IMG_1871.JPG_index.html

Other photos both before and after washing the accumulated crud stuck to 
the leaked oil are at
http://mimir.dyndns.org:8080/images/camera/Dave/08-04-2004/index.html

Thanks!

Dave Ellis
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
'93 S4