OEM 2007 Dodge Caravan Crankshaft

2007 Dodge Caravan Crankshaft Parts and Q&A

• Q: How to Safely Extract the Crankshaft from the Engine Assembly on 2007 Dodge Caravan?

  A: Before removing the crankshaft, you must first remove the whole engine from the vehicle and then separate the transaxle from the engine. After that, take off the drive plate/flex plate and the crankshaft rear oil seal. Fix the engine onto a repair stand, drain away the oil from the engine and take out the oil filter. The next step is to remove the crankshaft vibration damper, engine mount support bracket, front timing belt covers, timing belt, rear timing belt cover and oil pan. After that, take out the oil pump pick-up tube, crankshaft sprocket, oil pump, balance shafts and housing assembly and the crankshaft position sensor. Whenever either the piston or connecting rod needs to be replaced, you must take out the cylinder head. Place a permanent marker or paint on the top of each connecting rod cap to show the correct cylinder number, instead of stamping or punching it. Take out all the connecting rod bolts and their caps very carefully to avoid ruining the fracture rod and cap surfaces. Also, do not reuse these bolts. Following this, take out all the bed plate bolts from the engine block, then gently tap around the bed plate so its dowel pins come loose from the engine block without pushing on one edge. Because the dowel pins and thrust bearing could get broken if not careful, the bed plate needs to be removed all around evenly. Take great care when handling the crankshaft so as not to scrape the tone wheels and put in effort not to harm the main bearings or journals as you lift it from the cylinder head. Later, undo and get rid of the target ring mounting screws and unmount the target ring from the crankshaft.