Trouble replacing oil pan, (4wd) front axle bolt blocked

[GavinJking]

I am replacing the oil pan on my 2011 ford expedition el limited 4wd as the drain plug is striped. In the process I have dropped the sway bar and structural peice, and now need to lower the axle, there are 3 bolts (2 lower ones, 1 higher one) got the lower ones out and isn't enough to get the pan out, tried to get the upper one out but the steering shaft is blocking it. What do I do? Take it off too? (Don't have tons of tools) or is there another method? (3rd photo shows bolt almost out)

 

[S20Workstation4]

I did this a while ago on mine, 2010 Expy 4x4,
I had to remove the two bolts for the steering rack, which allowed it to drop enough.
Try that and see if it helps

 

[GavinJking]

I'm in the process of putting it back together, got the oil pan up. There was a angle the wheel turns to get the top axle bolt by the steering shaft. (Thanks Spav8r) Once I got that bolt down the axle could be dropped then from there it was a game of getting the oil pan past the trans lines which there's a couple bolts holding them. The oil pickup wasn't an issue for me so I just left it and got the pan past it. Took a whole 10 minutes to get the pan up past the lines which was a pain but eventually it worked.

 

[eddytheexpy]

Ah sorry I’m too late but I had this same issue. I really didn’t want to start screwing with those steering rack bolts and I realized the connector/knuckle of the intermediate steering shaft was the actual part that was in the way.

So I spent 5 minutes taking off the intermediate steering shaft with my fingers crossed and that did the trick! Gave me just enough clearance to sneak that bolt out.