[NINFan]

Just realized I never put the whole story on here.

So yeah, you need to get the car up on jack stands. I put them on the frame rails just at the front door posts. Remove the wheels, steering knuckle, (break the ball joints, strap up the calipers, etc. The nut on the hub is 36mm). Remove the front drive shaft and mark the u-joints to go back where they were. Remove the front axles - that wasn't as bad as I thought. Just bang on the cans and when the internal snap ring lets loose, you’ll see them starting to move out of the front diff. Then you can just yank them out from the outboard sides. You need to drop the entire steering linkage. Don’t bother trying to work around it – it’s easier to just drop the whole thing (leave the tie rod ends on and you can just wiggle the whole thing down) and put it back later. At that point, there are only 3 bolts on the front diff. take them out (leave the top one in for last) and you can get that last bolt out and the bushings will hold it in place until you can wiggle it out. It’s kinda heavy, so be careful. Also be careful because it’s full of gear lube (I drained it first cuz I knew I was gonna replace it, but I guess you don’t need to if the car is lo miles). Oh, you need to take the shift cable out first. That was kinda a pain cuz there’s a metal collar nut on a plastic housing and it’s easy to crack. I ended up taking the whole assembly off, which is probably better in the end. You can unbolt the 3 bolts that hold the plate against the diff and pull the whole thing back (it’s on a spring) and work a needle nose in there and pull the Jesus clip out. Reverse to install, but you need to snap the cable end back into the actuator (easy). Also, there’s a vent tube on the top of the front diff that’s a pain to get to. Anyway, with all that out of the way, you can finally get to the oil pan. You need to remove the oil filter adapter first (replace the o-ring and gasket when you re-install) and I just pushed them out of the way. BTW, make sure you have pans all over, cuz everything will be leaking (I’m assuming you’ve already drained the pan ). Now pull the two rubber plugs out that are in the holes between the bell housing and the back of the pan. There are 2 pan bolts up in there (that one took me a while to figure out ). You’re home free. Drop the pan, replace the pump (get a new plastic collar that keeps the 2 shafts together), any other inspections, and put everything back. Getting the front diff back in was a treat. You really need to work the top bushing back into it’s fitting, and that’s tough. I had the neighbor help, but it took a lot of grunting and groaning. Don’t start without re-connecting all the electrical connections or you’ll get the annoying “check gauges” light. (you can eliminate it by disconnecting the battery for a while. I think about 5 mins does it.)