I bought my 97 3500 five years ago. It had 306,000 miles when I bought it. Since day one I have always had a small oil leak near the front of the motor. It has not gotten any worse since I have owned it and when parked overnight there are maybe a dozen drops on the ground (no puddles). The track bar and front suspension has oil caked on them and also up around alternator. Does this sound like a KDP issue? I have put 223,000 additional miles on her and motor runs fine. I just wondered if the dowel pin may have fallen into pan before I purchased it and just caused a small hole in crankcase. If so would I have been able to drive it this long without any further problems? I am unable to visualize where the oil is actually coming from but there is lots of oil caked underneath the fan as well as the areas I mentioned previously.

 

It could be KDP related but theres a few things up there that could be causing the leak, not just the KDP. It could be the front crank seal, timing cover gasket, timing housing gasket or a hole popped from the inside out in the timing case from the gears throwing the loose pin through the case. Thats just a cast aluminum case so it's fairly easy to pop a hole with the loose dowel pin. I wouldn't automatically jump to it being the KDP but I'd pull it apart and put in the KDP repair kit and that'll shed a lot of light on the whole subject.

 

Get some brake cleaner or simple green and WASH WASH WASH the front of the engine and suspension down.

Once its oil free you will be able to see where it is coming from.

Have you ever adjusted your valves?

Any oil leaking around the valve covers?

 

As Digital Bullet stated, get the front of the engine clean so that you can see where it is coming from. If it is a kdp problem, then you will have to decide what to do about it if anything. If it isn't, then you should still open it up and tab the kdp as well as fix whatever is leaking oil. There isn't really any point in tearing into it until you know where the leak is and what parts you will need.