Coolant leak o-rings

[Emoandy05]

Hi all,

Appreciate your help in advance. I have a 2007 v8 with 205k on it. Recently I have noticed a coolant leak. One shop said I needed a new water pump. I took it to another shop for a second opinion. They did a pressure test and said no leak. However, the next day I noticed coolant leaking on the ground. I took it back to the same shop and told them it is still leaking. After checking it out again, they said the following:

"Coolant pump leaking from inside o-ring and bypass o-ring. Recommend replacement of coolant pump with o-ring and bypass hose o-ring as part of the timing belt package replacement due to contamination of timing belt by leaking coolant."

First of all I don't know how a pressure test would not have "caught" this issue in the first place. Second of all, I am a skeptical that the whole water pump needs to be replaced. It was just replaced 40k miles ago.

My question: Is replacing "inside o-ring and bypass o-ring" doable without replacing/removing the water pump? Seems the water pump itself is not leaking, but these o-rings are. Any guidance is greatly appreciated. I like to think I'm fairly competent working on cars, but I do not have any experience working with cooling system.

Thank you very much for your help.

 

[weaves]

You can replace the o-ring on the bypass tube without removing the water pump but the intake manifold has to come off. If the bypass tube o-ring is leaking from up top, it'll also run down to the crank pulley area which could easily be mistaken for a leaking water pump.

If coolant has in fact contaminated the timing belt then it needs be replaced but I would question how they determined that without pulling the timing belt covers. And it's generally a good idea to replace the water pump whenever you replace the timing belt regardless if it's leaking or not.

 

[AuSeeker]

Hi all,

Appreciate your help in advance. I have a 2007 v8 with 205k on it. Recently I have noticed a coolant leak. One shop said I needed a new water pump. I took it to another shop for a second opinion. They did a pressure test and said no leak. However, the next day I noticed coolant leaking on the ground. I took it back to the same shop and told them it is still leaking. After checking it out again, they said the following:

"Coolant pump leaking from inside o-ring and bypass o-ring. Recommend replacement of coolant pump with o-ring and bypass hose o-ring as part of the timing belt package replacement due to contamination of timing belt by leaking coolant."

First of all I don't know how a pressure test would not have "caught" this issue in the first place. Second of all, I am a skeptical that the whole water pump needs to be replaced. It was just replaced 40k miles ago.

My question: Is replacing "inside o-ring and bypass o-ring" doable without replacing/removing the water pump? Seems the water pump itself is not leaking, but these o-rings are. Any guidance is greatly appreciated. I like to think I'm fairly competent working on cars, but I do not have any experience working with cooling system.

Thank you very much for your help.

I see where there's a recommendation to replace the water pump...during the replacement of the timing belt because of deterioration of the timing belt from the coolant leaking on it.

I can tell you this that the coolant leaking onto the timing belt will indeed damage it to the point it should be replaced or you risk it breaking which will usually damage your engine beyond repair, there's another member here who replaced his timing belt but didn't replace the water pump because it wasn't leaking, almost everyone replaces the water pump or should replace it even if it looks to be fine or even fairly new because you basically have to replace or at least remove the timing belt to replace the water pump if it goes bad, so to replace to replace the water pump you have to do most everything you have to do to replace the timing belt, about 20,000 to 30,000 miles later his timing belt broke due to the water pump that had started to leak at some point onto the timing belt which indeed damaged his engine to the point he had to replace the engine.

Now you say the water pump was replaced 40,000 miles ago, was the timing belt replaced at the same time(?), if not I would have replaced it then, either way whoever replaced the water pump apparently didn't do the job correctly or it should be leaking at this point...but if it wasn't an OEM water pump that also could be the reason it's leaking.

That all being said if the timing belt needs to be replaced I would HIGHLY recommend replacing the water pump at the same time along with all related gaskets and oil rings, etc., I would also HIGHLY recommend using only OEM parts!!