hardline_42
06-18-2007, 08:24 AM
I've had an oil leak from the front of my engine since I bought the car. I had already ruled out the oil pan and crank seal. This weekend I decided to change the water pump seal to eliminate one more possibility.
It went pretty smoothly until I had to remove the water pump. No matter how many rags I stuffed under it, I still managed to soak the Opti in coolant. I unplugged the #1 plug wire and the one directly above it (#3 maybe?) from the Opti and, sure enough, there was coolant in the boot. It's a vented Opti so I figured, as long as I let it air out, it would be okay.
In order to get the old water pump seal out and the new one in, I had to get the Opti out of the way. I removed the bolts and pulled it straight out just far enough so that my "Hi-Liter" installation tool could clear it. After installing the seal and o-ring on the w/p shaft, I pushed the Opti back on as well as I could. I had to wiggle it a little to get it to fit but it didn't seem like enough to get the timing out of sync (I could be wrong).
I torqued everything to spec, reinstalled everything, topped off the coolant and started it up. I let it warm up for a little while (I swapped in a 160* t-stat with a couple of 1/8" holes drilled in it so it may not have fully "warmed up") and took it for a spin around the neighborhood. It idled fine and ran just as well as before. There were no leaks, coolant or otherwise and I was pretty proud of myself for not blowing up the car.
This morning I started on my way out to work. It ran fine for a while, but when it warmed up it started running rough. It felt weak and wouldn't rev. Going up hills felt like the car was gonna rattle itself to pieces. I'm almost positive it's a timing/distributor issue.
So my question is, is my Opti failing or is the timing off? If my Opti is full of coolant, is there an easy way to clean it out, or do I need to spring for a new one? TIA.
It went pretty smoothly until I had to remove the water pump. No matter how many rags I stuffed under it, I still managed to soak the Opti in coolant. I unplugged the #1 plug wire and the one directly above it (#3 maybe?) from the Opti and, sure enough, there was coolant in the boot. It's a vented Opti so I figured, as long as I let it air out, it would be okay.
In order to get the old water pump seal out and the new one in, I had to get the Opti out of the way. I removed the bolts and pulled it straight out just far enough so that my "Hi-Liter" installation tool could clear it. After installing the seal and o-ring on the w/p shaft, I pushed the Opti back on as well as I could. I had to wiggle it a little to get it to fit but it didn't seem like enough to get the timing out of sync (I could be wrong).
I torqued everything to spec, reinstalled everything, topped off the coolant and started it up. I let it warm up for a little while (I swapped in a 160* t-stat with a couple of 1/8" holes drilled in it so it may not have fully "warmed up") and took it for a spin around the neighborhood. It idled fine and ran just as well as before. There were no leaks, coolant or otherwise and I was pretty proud of myself for not blowing up the car.
This morning I started on my way out to work. It ran fine for a while, but when it warmed up it started running rough. It felt weak and wouldn't rev. Going up hills felt like the car was gonna rattle itself to pieces. I'm almost positive it's a timing/distributor issue.
So my question is, is my Opti failing or is the timing off? If my Opti is full of coolant, is there an easy way to clean it out, or do I need to spring for a new one? TIA.