Thought Id update this. Threw in a new front seal and that solved the leaking issues. However, despite 4+ hours of diagnosing I was unable to get rid of the P300 misfire code. Swapped coils, plugs, ohm checked the plug wires, nothing. Looked at the logs and it turned out I had a lazy O2 sensor so I changed that. Continued throwing the code, so I just deleted the code off the ECM. Drove it for the past 4 months without issues.
I also noticed the oil pressure guage was really not sticking around 60PSI like it used to. Spends more time around 30. Hooked a mechanical guage and its got low oil pressure. 50 at cold cruise, 20-24 at hot cruise and 5 maybe at hot idle. Sent an oil sample in to get checked and the oil has elevated aluminum content. No copper though so the bearings are fine. Im not sure if I cracked the oilpump housing when I changed the front seal or if a 190K mile engine that is positivly beat on finally wore out or what. Im going to pull the motor out when Im off college for spring break and throw on headers, E85, port the heads, rering and bearing the block, put in my 3400 stall converter I picked up, and whatever else pops up.
Nevertheless, Im still daily driving it. It's absolutly frightening to drive in the cold since it makes so much more power and I have the old 16" tires on it for winter so it will spin if I stomp on it at like 35mph. If I throw a rod out I will just pick up another $300 shortblock. The more I think about it the more I just want to pull the timing cover off and look at the pump.
Ive got a set of studded snows for it that Im throwing on too. It was decent in the snow last year but it absolutly sucks this year.
