well, last oil change my drain plug stripped. being me, i refuse to heli-coil it with it on. loctite is holding it in for now with what threads are left, but next change the pan has to come off. whats the deal with the big warning on the pan saying alignment critical.. im guessing a crank scraper or something.. how do you align it correctly?
this is my 05 z71 ( aluminum block HO 5.3L)

 

i'd be careful with this.
even for my year, Haynes says that there has to be specific clearence between the transmission and oil pan. you might want to look into specs and maybe get some gauges before you take it apart.
btw, if you only have plug head stripped, why not replace it? or you have in-pan nut threads bust?

 

...twice ive wrote out my reply and the forum crapped out with a 404 error AGAIN...
let me try a 3rd time
the pan threads are stripped out.( its an aluminum oil pan)
i have any indicator i would ever need, im thinking there is an alignment tool that looks like some piece of crap with a few holes in it to align the pan. i really want to know what the reason is for it, and the correct way to align it.
i build engines often, and specialty transmissions daily. im not just the average guy with a crecent wrench and vise grips trying to fix something i know nothing about lol.
im just too cheap to go buy a worthless book that tells me the same thing the warning on the pan does and doesnt give any more info about it. Hoping one of the GM techs will chime in and fill me in a little bit.

 

Give MDTAHOE a chance to read this post he may be able to give some insight as to what the alignment is all about