General maintenance questions

[AbramJ]

Today I changed the engine oil/filter, the transmission filter/pan gasket/fluid, and replaced the power steering return line because it was leaking.

Now that I got all those leaks to stop (for now) I noticed the steering gear box itself is leaking from the location in the red circle



Is this something I can fix myself? If so, how involved/hard is it to do?

I also need to reseal the rear axle (GM 12 bolt). I have the lube locker differential cover gasket and a Yukon pinion seal. I plan to remove the axle from the truck to clean and repaint it. Are there more seals I should look at/replace? Is it easier to replace the pinion seal while the axle is sill on the truck, or does it not matter?

I plan on pulling the leaf springs and cleaning/painting them as well. How difficult is that to do? I've read that I should replace the U bolts when I do this, do you all have any recommendations, or are they all pretty similar? I should probably replace all the bushings too, should I go with polyurethane or will stock rubber do fine for my relatively stock truck?

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[MEMO43]

If you can confirm that it indeed is coming from the circled area.
then it is coming from the steering box itself.
It's not really a hard job to do, I just did this on my sons k20.
I recommend replacing the rag joint (steering coupler) while you are there or do the xj shaft conversion. Lots of talk on here about it.
I had my son help me since the box is heavy an commersom.
Also a good time to clean the area behind the box an inspect for cracks, our rigs are notorious of it.
I rate it a 6 on a difficulty level
4 bolts hold the box to the frame
1 bolt on the gear shaft (collar) two bolts to undo the rag joint.
either a pitman arm puller ( most auto parts stores rent these)
Cotter pin (attached to the drag link) to remove the pitman arm.
I recommend doing this with the wheels on the ground, that way you don't mess up the steering wheel orientation.
Once you have the new box installed count the number of turns, that way you center up the steering wheel again.
also good time to drain the power steering fluid prior to any work being done, nothing worse than having it leak as you are trying to wrk on it.
search the forums here and YouTube an Google are a good source for videos as well