88 FI oil pan removal

Looking to remove the oil pan without removing the motor. All the front wheel drive gear is crap, so we will be removing it. Let me stress that this is a junker truck, that we use for dirt roads only.

After this front end stuff is removed, is it possible to remove the oil pan? Should we attempt to unbolt everything, or just start cutting?

:naughty:

Ok, after chopping through the front axles, and contorting our tools and ourselves to many odd positions, the front diff assembly is removed. The front DS is gone as well. Now we have a good view of the oil pan. Now it looks like we need to disconnect the tranny bellhousing from the engine to remove the oil pan. Is this right? I never thought removing the pan would be such a huge ordeal (I have a jeep YJ, and it was super simple).

Any advice/tips/words of encouragement for us? Oil pan needs to be removed so it can either be replaced or the holes welded.