Water Pump Change

Draining the old fluid:

First off, drain out as much old coolant as you can. Jack up the back of the car higher than the front, remove the front-most underbody cover (seven 10mm bolts), and remove either the drain bolts shown here, or use the draincock on the bottom of the radiator. I chose to use these 2 drain bolts, because my radiator draincock was plugged. Make sure to remove the radiator cap and also loosen the drain cock on the top of the radiator. This will allow air to vent into the pipes, allowing the coolant to drain out easier.

Here's what came out. Nice and brown huh? They say this is from mixing the Toyota red coolant with the typical Prestone green stuff. Make sure to dispose of this stuff properly. Ya wouldn't want to kill any of your neighbors pets now would ya???

 

You can chose one of two routes here. Either flush out the system now, or go ahead and change out the pump. I decided to change out the pump next. Here's how to go about that:

Removal of old water pump

1) Remove the 2 hoses circled below and remove the coolant reservoir by pulling it straight up.

 

2) To give you 'plenty' of room to get to the water pump, remove the radiator cap mounting tube. Do this by removing the spring clips (shown in the square box on the right and pointed to by the red arrow) clamping the hose to this plastic tube. Remove the two 10mm bolts shown in the green circles. Then remove the hose going from the radiator cap to the engine, by removing the spring cliip contained in the left red square.

 

Here's the result of the above removal. You can start to see the water pump now...

 

And here's the parts that you just removed:

 

3) Now, disconnect the 3 different wires (black, green, and blue connectors) that will be in your way and tuck them away someplace..

4) The next thing you should do is loosen (not remove) the water pump pulley bolts (four 10mm bolts shown in the red square). This is alot easier to do while the belt is still in place.

 

To get to all the bolts on the pump pulley you will have to turn the crank pulley. Do this by using a 17mm socket on the below circled bolt. To make this easier to turn it's best to remove the spark plugs. (I didn't do this however...) You have to remove the bottom engine cover (about seven 10mm bolts) to get to this easier.

 

4) Remove the alternator and it's adjustor bracket. If you have not done this before, refer to my alternator write-up for the removal process. (some of the below steps show the alternator in the pics still. I didn't remove it till I had to, but I would recommend doing it now.

5) Remove the water pump pulley bolts that you loosened earlier and remove the pulley.

6) Remove the 'coolant inlet housing' located in the red square box (two 10mm bolts from the front and one 10mm bolt that needs to be removed from under the car).

 

7) Remove timing belt cover #3. Here's a pics of the cover removed to give you an idea of where all the 10mm bolts are located.

Here's a pic of the timing belt cover #3 removed.

 

8) If you have AC, remove the AC idle pulley. The below picture already has the belts off but it should give you an idea of where the pulley is located, between and above the crank and AC pulleys. Use a 14mm box end wrench to remove the nut from the pulley.

The red circle below shows where the 15mm bolt (it's a real long one) that holds the idle pulley bolt in place. Remove this bolt. The idle pulley should now be free, so remove it and the two belts.

Here's the idle pulley after removal:

 

9) There are only 2 bolts holding timing cover #2 on, since #3 is out. Get to them from below the car, and here are pics of where they are located:

Here's the one near the rear of the car, 10mm. (Ignore the fact that the new water pump is already in, I took the pics out of order.)

And here's the one on the other side of the crank. It's right behind the idle pulley bracket and is a pain to get to. I found a 10mm offset boxed wrench to do the job (luckily I had one).

Here's a couple pics of the two removed timing covers. The one on the right shows how they are assembled when on the car. Be careful when removing timing cover #2, as the needle on the timing belt idle pulley comes out the hole in the bottom left of the cover. It's actually a plug that surrounds this needle, that you can remove if you want/need to.

 

10) Remove the water pump bolts. There are two 12mm bolts (red circles) & one 10mm bolt (green circle) that hold the complete housing to the engine block. And also there's 4 other 10mm bolts that hold the pump to the suction cover (not circled).

Remove the oil dipstick thingy, by pulling it straight out. Make sure to cover the hole with a rag or something. Once you are sure all the bolts are off, remove the water pump portion. It may take some pressure on it to remove it. I had quite a bit of coolant leakage here when I did this, since I didn't bother draining the engine block. So make sure to have your pan close by. (Note: Feel free to drain the engine block if you'd like to be a little neater than me. Consult the BGB for it's location.)

11) Remove the 2 below indicated 10mm bolts, which hold the suction cover to a coolant pipe. You can then easily remove the suction cover from the engine bay.

A couple pics of the water pump removed. Nasty down there huh?

And here's a couple of the removed water pump and suction cover:

 

Removal is now complete. Goto the next page for the install and flush process.

Installation of Water Pump

1) Time to clean everything up (via Simple Green, WD40 & Carb Cleaner) and organize all the parts. Here's what all you should have:

 

2) Permatex the 2 o-rings on the suction cover (update: ended up not using the o-ring on the left side of this picture, I just permatex'd the crap out of it.)

Note: If you have removed the timing belt it is not necessary to put the suction cover and water pump on separately. You can bolt the 2 together, and then bolt the assembly to the block.

 

3) Loosen the coolant pipe by removing the 10 or 12mm bolt shown here, that leads from the suction cover to the thermostat housing:

 

4) Very carefully, place the suction cover onto the block and into this pipe. Make sure that the o-ring that attaches to the block didn't shift on you and that you still have some permatex back there. Secure (don't tighten) the cover to the coolant pipe, either from up top....

or below:

 

5) Permatex the crap out of the water pump:

 

6) Very carefully, again, place the pump over the suction cover. Secure the pump to the cover by using a couple of the 10mm bolts to hold them together. Then line up the assembly with the block, and bolt it down with the 10mm (the longest one) and the 12mm bolts. (Note: The 10mm bolt for the assembly is for the uppermost hole.) Tighten down everything securely, according to the torque specs in the BGB, 9 & 11 ft-lbs I believe.

Also, don't forget to install the oil dipstick guide, since it attaches to the water pump. Put a lil RTV on its gasket.

 

7) At this point I would suggest to reinstall the coolant inlet housing onto the engine and then taking a break. This way after a couple hours of letting the RTV cure, you can check the water pump for leaks by simply filling the system with water. If you notice any leaks from simply filling it up, you will not have wasted time putting everything else back together. Use the new o-ring and gasket that came with the pump assembly when installing the inlet housing. Also, use some RTV on the surfaces.

8) Once you are sure that the pump isn't leaking, you may continue putting everything back on. Start with timing cover #2. Again, here are the 2 bolts that need to be replaced:

 

9) Next up is the AC idle pulley. Insert the bolt and it's washer (circled):

And then the pulley, 'big' washer, and the nut. Tighten the nut down until the pulley is secure, and then make sure the hole in the bolt head is aligned with the hole in the top of the bracket.

The red-circled hole.

Then, thread the long 15mm bolt through the idle pulley bolt. No need to tighten it down fully, just get the threads so they atleast pass all the way through the bolt head.

10) Next, install the water pump pulley and bolts. Don't worry about tightening the bolts for now.

 

11) Install the belts. Water pump and alternator belt go on the innermost crank pulley, then AC belt. Go ahead and tighten the AC belt, by pushing the idle pulley up while under the car. You may need to loosen the nut a little. I tried prying the pulley up with a big screwdriver, but the best method I found was just by pushing it up with your free hand, and then tightening the nut down with your other hand. Use one of them belt tensioner gauges (or index finger) to make sure the belt isn't too loose or too tight. Get out from under the car, and tighten down the AC idle pulley bolt (the long 15mm one).

12) Install the water inlet housing with new gaskets.

 

12) Re-install alternator. In the below pic, the above mentioned AC idle pulley bolt is shown in the red square. The green arrow is pointing to the alternator of course. If you need assistance with the alternator refer to my alternator write-up.

 

13) Reinstall Timing cover #3. Again, here's a picture of it uninstalled so u can figure out where all the bolts are located. The one in the bottom middle is the toughest to get to.

 

14) Reinstall radiator cap hardware and hose. Don't forget to reconnect those 3 wire connectors. Also ground the yellow/black wire onto the body through one of the green circled bolts.

 

15) And finally, the coolant reservoir:

 

Goto the next page for the coolant flush process...

Flushing the coolant system

Here's what I found to be the simplest for me. There are a few other ways to do this, e.g. using the radiator drain cock. But the drain cock on mine is plugged, so that didn't work.

1) Remove the drain bolt on the coolant pipe going from the radiator cap to the radiator, the red circled one below (leave the other bolt on, unlike the below pic). Then without the car running, the rear of the car higher than the front, place a garden hose at the radiator cap, and begin running water through. Run the water through, until it becomes clear. Of course this may take a few pan-fulls. So watch the level of the pan closely. A second person to run the hose while you monitor the pan during this entire process helps tremendously. Be prepared to get your hands dirty when placing the bolt back on as it is still draining out and your pan is full. Replace the bolt when done.

 

2) Next up is flushing out the radiator. (This can get messy, and it is possible to skip this step if you don't want to clean up after yourself) Remove both upper and lower hoses on the radiator, by moving the spring clips. Then place the garden hose into the upper hole in the radiator, draining the water out of the lower one. Flush it until clear water comes through, and then replace the hoses.

 

3) Now, use the drain bolt on the coolant pipe, that leads to the thermostat (red circle, leave the other bolt on, unlike shown in the below pic). Run the garden hose from the radiator cap flushing out the system from the radiator cap, up through the radiator and back halfway under the car. Again, once it turns clear you're done with this step. Replace bolt.

 

4) Now for the engine block and the rest of the way up this pipe. Make sure all coolant bolts and hoses you removed before are securely fastened. Fill up the system with water from the garden hose, until it's full in the radiator cap. Start up the car, with the heater control set to hot (no need to turn the fan on). Monitor the level in the radiator cap to keep it topped off. Once you see the water start to bubble over, place the radiator cap on halfway (to the first click). When the car approaches normal operating temperature, it is time to remove one of the coolant pipe drain bolts. (mine was about 2/3 the way up to normal operating temp when I undid the bolt) Have the person that is running the hose, be ready for when you remove the bolt, you would like to keep the coolant level topped off. Be very, very careful when undoing the bolt. The coolant will be hot and it will come out of the hole fairly quickly. I'd suggest wearing a good set of gloves when doing this. Just make sure not to drop the bolt in the pan. When the pan is almost full, replace the bolt. Again this will be messy, and the coolant coming out of the hole will be hot. Empty the pan and keep the garden hose running to top off the level. Once the pan is empty, position it again and undo the bolt, repeating this entire process till the water is clear. After a few times, the coolant cools down from the constant running of the garden hose water running through. So it becomes less painful...

Now repeat this process again, but with the other bolt on the coolant pipe. It won't take near as long doing this one. Keep the car running during this entire process, making sure to keep the coolant level topped off.

 

Here's a pic of the first night of flushing the system, over 8.5 gallons. About 2.5gallons came from draining the car initially (I ran out of containers). This was the morning after, before taking the containers to empty at the local recycling center. Once you notice that the coolant is starting to thin out it is probably safe to dump in your yard. Don't quote me on that, save the environment...

 

5) When you are satisfied with the color of the water coming out of the coolant pipe, turn the car & garden hose off, and drain as much of the water out as you can. Then start filling the system with the Toyota coolant. Follow the repair manual for the filling procedure. Below is just a pic of the Toyota coolant mixed with water, 50/50.

 

Overall, this wasn't too terribly bad a project. It was my first 'big' repair on my '2. I worked on it for 3 nights after work. I screwed up the first night, installing the pump and had major leakage when I went to fill it up with water. The second night tearing everything apart and putting it back together again was really easy as I knew what all had to come out and how to get to everything. I also started the coolant flush the second night, filled the system with the Prestone Coolant Flush, and drove to work the next day. The third night was spent flushing the coolant system completely and thoroughly. This time I had a friend help me which sped up the process alot. I would figure a good long weekend day to do this, especially if you are going to flush the system out well and if you haven't done the water pump or timing belt before. But if I had to do it again, it would probably only take a few hours. Just be prepared to move from working under the car to working over the car to working under the car to ....

Hopefully, these instructions will help in giving an idea of what all needs to come out. That seems to be the biggest problem with the BGB. Good luck!

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Article submitted on 26 Dec 2010
Last modified on 15 Mar 2011
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