Ok. First of all i hate the haynes or whatever its called manuel...it sucks. Now the story. Right now my max is undriveale do to a water pump failure that i tried to fix. (tried being the key word). I got to my water pump with not too much trouble got my serpentine belt off easily then the fun begins. Both the haynes and the chilton manuels said to put 8m bolt on the top and bottom bolt holes which i did. Then as i'm screwing the bolts in slowly like they said to to do, the top bolt's hole breaks off followed shortly after by the bottom bolts hole. So now i have a water pump STUCK and i mean stuck in there good. I can't pry, pull or pray it out, i've tried them all. WTF has this ever happened to anybody. How in the f0ck am i supposed to get it out. What i'm planning on doing is tomorrow when i get some daylight, i'm gonna take my drill and dremel and drill the teeth off of the old water pump so i can more easily slip it by the timing chain. I've already loosened the timing chains tension but not by using the method that either book said. That didn't work at all. The damn piston that your supposed to push in before you stick a pin in the whole, doesn't go in AT ALL with anything i tried everything. After i drill teeth off of the old pump i'm just gonna use some big wrench pry bar to yank it out HOPEFULLY. unless someone has a better idea and please say that you do. Any constructive help would be great. This is the last time i try to play mechanic on the max, she's going to a professional from now on.

 

bump bump bump

 

Drill the bolts carefully, retap the threads to clean them out and use grade 8 bolts next time? How hard were you wrenching them?

-RMB

 

Nope you didn't get what i said the flanges broke not the bolts. But thats behind me, i got everything out today and when i started my car there was a terrible noise coming from either the belts or the timing chain. Either way it didn't go away after a 20 min. trip but that car did overheat again WITH THE NEW WATER PUMP INSTALLED. So i have no F---- clue whats going on i'm just gonna do an engine swap i'm ****ed.

 

How did you diagnose that your water pump was bad? Was it leaking coolant?

Oh, and you shouldn't give up on DIY stuff on your car. The water pump job is a doozy. Ain't no joke. All the other jobs are cake in comparison.

DW

 

well my brother in law thought something had cracked so we took of the timing chain cover and so i didn't have any trouble removing the water pump. What i am having trouble is putting the water pump back on. Like i can't get it to grab the screws. The screws are 2 short. Any one have any ideas. I also i a dumb *** i am messed up the timing on my timing chain.

 

Hey man, props for going after the pump yourself. I know I'd try
before I let anyone else at it. I want to learn from your experience,
so what caused it to be stuck enough to break off the flanges but
still allowed you to get it out without the use of the flanges.
Was the pump sprocket caught on the chain?

 

Believe it or not it was the O-rings holding the water pump in. The O rings... i Sh-t you not! I was amazed. Eventually i just got it out by using 2 pry bars one on top one on bottom. Lemmie just say that this is not recommended =). The whole job took me about 12 hours split over 2 days. Thats with an oh sh-t factor of about 6 hours ( you know thats when crazy crap goes wrong that your not expecting). Now i'm just screwed though, Something is making the worst noice ever, its either my belts or my timing chain, AND the damn car is STILL over heating this sucks so bad. I did have a bad coolant leak thats why i thought the pump was bad. Plus it was making a sound kinda like whining. Now the sound is MUCH worse. I really don't know what to do, i know i can get a much younger engine for the same price as its gonna cost them to rip my engine apart if it is something with the timing belt.

 

I did the same thing a few months back. I broke one of the flanges off of the water pump. I tried to pry it out and yank it out etc. for over two days. Damn I was mad. I took out the tensioner and tried help loosen the chain but I could not even take out the water pump. So I put the water pump back and had the car towed to a mechanic. The mechanic took out the timing belt cover and oil pan to get to the screw that holds the cover and took out the water pump. But be very careful not to mess up the timing. So it was not too bad though the mistake only cost me $260 for labor plus parts. He replaced my belts, my radiator, and water pump.) Also one more thing he found a fuse that was loose to make the radiator fan turn on so make sure you check that as well.