Water pump just too a dump
 

On my way to work, my water pump failed. Red light started flashing, but temp just got beyond the 0 in the 180. My car is now waiting for the flatbed to take it home so I can replace the water pump. There is a small puddle under the car.

I've already got the low temperature thermostat, but need to get a replacement pump from our local Porsche dealer. Doubt I can find another OEM water pump form another source, but if you know of one please let me know.

As for replacement coolant, I can also get that form the dealer, but I've seen a few threads in regard to Mercedes and or VM/Audi coolant. It OK to use? Or should I just stick with the OEM coolant?

how many miles did you get out of the wp?

72K. Was just getting parts together for a preventative replacement. <sigh> At least I am assuming the water pump and not other failure. Can't tell without removing the front engine shield to take a look.

I was warned not to take a chance with potentially mixing different coolant with the Porsche coolant for fear of particulate formation. That being said I don't know enough about it to say that the Audi Coolant doesn't come from the same "well".

Well, I expect I'll be draining all the coolant, flushing with water, refilling with distilled water for a final flush, and then replace the coolant (50% coolant 50% distilled). I'm just not sure what I can get and/or use. The Porsche dealer parts department isn't even picking up the phone so I may just call Suncoast and see about an overnight ship of the parts.

Pelican Parts will get it to you overnite in SoCA

Thanks. I was just checking Suncoast for price vs. shipping. I'll check out Pelican Parts too.

Check out Rector Porsche (Burlingame, CA), their online store has great prices and being in CA you will get the part in a day or two

JFP kindly suggested them a while back and I had great experiences with them..
.

Thanks. Ill add them to my online list. I ordered the water pump and new cap from suncoast for about $350 delivered by Friday afternoon. I'm in a rental from hertz until the weekend when I can install the new parts.

Might be a little bit too late with this info, but I got my OEM water pump and gasket from Sunset Porsche in Oregon online for $252.90 last year. Ordered it on Thursday and it came UPS on Friday!

Flashing coolant light and coolant on the ground near the RR wheel might just be the plastic coolant tank. Pull up the carpet and plywood in your trunk, if coolant is pooled underneath, you have a cracked coolant tank.

My wp also took a dive this morning, but did not mind or was surprised. It was a trooper and lasted for 140.7k miles. I was able to drive it to dealer with needle below the normal temp; I made sure I filled up the reservior before making the trip. Mechanic confirmed the wp was leaking.

I am planning on a 3500 plus km road trip this summer to Canada's east coast and was considering replacing the water pump on my 2000 Base Boxster with 93,000 km (about 57,000 miles) as a precautionary measure, based upon the suggestion of some on this site (in other threads) that this should be done as a prophylactic on cars when they reach 60,000 miles. Pedro (of Pedro's Board) has opined that if a water pump aint broke, don't fix it. He has over 200.000 miles on the original water pump in his 986 and specializes in servicing 986 Boxsters, so I suspect he should know of what he speaks. Furthermore, it will take me another 3 years to reach even the 72,000 miles at which AKnowles failed (and forever to reach the 142,000 miles at which grtc-68's failed).

Pedro suggests that when you replace the serpentine belt (as I am doing before the trip), to check for signs of beaing play in the pulley and leakage (even small amounts will dry and show as a white powder on the aluminum). If no signs of either, then there is no need to replace the pump as failure is not imminent.

I know, some have had bad luck with water pumps faling early on and, even with failure of mulitple water pumps. As to the latter, I wonder how many replaced the original pump with a cheaper, non-Porsche pump. Furthermore, if the sealed coolant system develops a leak or air lock (for example, with an earlier failure of the coolant expansion tank), the impeller is far more likely to fail as they do not like running dry, or pushing air! In any event, when I asked my own mechanic if he thought I should replace the pump even if there are no signs of failure, he said: "Yes, some fail early. Of course, I have had some transmissions and engines fail early too - do you want me to replace those as a precautionary measure?"

Just wondering how many here have had an original waterpump fail at mileage under, say 65,000 miles that:
1. Had not previously had a failure of the coolant expansion tank; or
2. Had not otherwise previously had to add coolant to what is supposed to be a closed system (and hence never need coolant added)?
3. Had checked the pulley for play and looked for signs of even minor leakage around the shaft and found none shortly before failure.

Brad

Well FWIW, my water pump is out. I'd planned to replace the thermostat too, but looks the original hose was already repalced. I see screw clamps instead of spring clamps. The hoses have some ridges in them too, so it looks like I need to replace all of the hoses under there so will wait to replace the thermostat until next weekend. Besides, I think it'll be a lot easier to cut off the hoses than try and remove them. The water pump was difficult enough. It was the original water puimp, original gasket, and hose (with spring clamp).

Turns out my water pump bearing went. No broken vanes. Just a tiny 1/8" wear point on the peak of the vanes. The pump pully though started to wear in to the top most bolt. Just left a slight score mark,

I did find my coolant was green. Probably Prestone. I'll be flushing that out prior to refilling it with OEM coolant tomorrow.