transmission oil leak still after replacing oil seal at outgoing drive shaft

My TF was leaking transmission oil from one side of the outgoing drive shaft, It was the right side, from perspective standing behind the car.
I had the MG garage replace the oil seal. But this did not solve the problem entirely, the point where the drive shaft enters the transmission is still full of oil, and is somewhat dripping on the floor of the parking place after a long drive on the highway. Not completely leaking out, but some drips.
According to the mechanic this could not be fixed, because there is too much play on the outgoing drive shaft. Indeed when I try too wiggle the drive shaft at the entering point to the transmission, it has some radial play. The mechanic said the solution is to check the transmission oil level sometimes and add some oil when needed. The real fix would be to remove the tranmission and overhaul it, a very expensive solution because to do that the car must be detached from the subframe. At least that was his diagnosis. I know there are 2 types of oil seals MG used, and according to the garage they mounted the correct one. I have no way of checking that.

So I am wondering, do any of you have had this leaking tranmission problem, and what did you do to fix it. Did you check the play on the drive shaft and should this be almost none, or is it common to MG's to have some play at this point ?

The transmission itself is working like a charm, no strange noises, very smooth shifting. The car has almost 140.000 km (about 87000 miles) on the clock.
But I don't like the idea of loosing transmission oil at every trip, and I am probably not the first MG driver having this issue, so help is much appreciated.

Thanks for your opinion.

My TF leaked out pretty much the full gearbox on a round trip from Yorkshire to Southampton. I had both seals replaced last week and that has sorted it. The seals can't be mixed up as the left seal is significantly smaller than the right.

Thanks, good to know that the seal replacement should have solved the problem completely.
Besides L+R there is also a difference depending if you have an early or late MG. Well described on the competitor forum : https://mgfregister.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=25554

But I am also interested if the driveshaft should have a tight fit at the gearbox-entry, or is it possible to have some radial play, being able to jiggle it a bit. So if anyone has the MG on the ramp, a quick check would be much appreciated.

Just had a "jiggle" and no play at all and thankfully no drips .

I've got exactly the same issue, currently getting around 1000miles per 100ml of gearbox oil.

Well, I will check after a few thousand km's how much has leaked out, by refilling it.
According to the garage to solve it the complete gearbox should be replaced / overhauled, but looking at the diagrams an option could be to change the diff bearings, These seem accessible from underneath the car with the gearbox in place. Too much play will likely be caused by worn bearings I think. The only thing is, if these are pressed in, removal won't be possible, but according to the diagram the bearings are held in place by a snap ring, which would make things easier.
I will also check if the correct oil seal has been mounted by the garage.

tnjk wrote: Well, I will check after a few thousand km's how much has leaked out, by refilling it.
According to the garage to solve it the complete gearbox should be replaced / overhauled, but looking at the diagrams an option could be to change the diff bearings, These seem accessible from underneath the car with the gearbox in place. Too much play will likely be caused by worn bearings I think. The only thing is, if these are pressed in, removal won't be possible, but according to the diagram the bearings are held in place by a snap ring, which would make things easier.
I will also check if the correct oil seal has been mounted by the garage.

You can’t replace the diff bearings with the box on the car sorry, same problem my self 😤


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