steering gearbox seal

I have a 1963 TBird with a leaking gear box. spent a good part of the summer trying to source a good rebuilt one. I won,t go into my tale of woh but its been frustrating. So now i have 2 leaking gearboxes of the correct type, they cannot be resealed and put under pressure due to the fact that...

Hi does anyone know if the upper seal where the column attaches can be easily replaced without major surgery? If I remove the snap ring are parts going to fly out and never be seen again :-) Thanks Andy