Full radiator block may have killed my water pump

whereswally606 · 11-27-2012, 04:03 PM

My mechanic friend Tommy took a look at my very noisy Insight, which had developed a strange generator sound like an ebike hub motor on very heavy regen braking. Turns out the problem was my water pump motor so definitely an electric problem of sorts. It caused no error codes but the degrees centigrade on the way back from Norfolk to Manchester over the peak district were causing 100C highs. to counter this i put the heaters on full 32 C and four fan strength. This dropped the temp down to 90C but to make the drive tolerable i had to have the windows almost fully open and the weather was terrible (read: pissing it down, floods in UK at the mo)

anyway couldnt have come at a worst time since i needed the car to take my thesis back to Bangor this week but managed to get a train ticket for £15 instead.

pump costs £117

tommy's time approx £70 odd

and maybe could have been avoided if i had not used a radiator block?

I take it out in the summer but never mind. live and learn. I just hope its all better by next week. ill keep you posted.

**MN Driver** · 11-27-2012, 04:28 PM

The water pump is not electrical, there is no motor to it. It's belt driven. 100C shouldn't cause any problem for your water pump, if it failed it would have been from a different reason. I've seen 100C on mine climbing steep mountains for minutes at a time without much issue. With a full condenser block, not sandwiched between the radiator and condenser, the radiator fan can still do its job if the temperature climbs.

**highwater** · 11-27-2012, 05:07 PM

Ditto,

Radiator block not the cause.
I've run my Gen 1 with a full engine blanket wrapped up behind a full radiator block with gapping holes in fender wells covered and center belly pan. Have tried to block all air flow. In coldest winter temps I use only the cabin heat for radiator.

Water pump is not electrical.

Water pumps fail for many reasons.

Randall

whereswally606 · 11-27-2012, 06:20 PM

thanks for the infos guys. Guess it might not be electrical then, guess i might not have killed it with the rad block. but it seems to be that part he identified. anyway ill know by next week whether its fixed or not. the sound is horrible from this car at the moment.

Cobb · 11-27-2012, 08:00 PM

A water pump is a very simple device. Its a case with a hole for a seal and bearing. The shaft has a impeller on one side and either studs for a pulley or a pulley already mounted. They contain a bleed hole to let fluid leak out before damaging the bearing in the even they need to be replaced. Many will plug this hole with a sheet metal screw to drive on and the bearings start to squeek and make noises til the leak passes the bearing.

The only way you can cause a water pump to fail early other than using the wrong fluid in the cooling system is to use rtv instead of a gasket and soo much that it squirts out and blocks the flow of coolant.

whereswally606 · 12-08-2012, 05:03 PM

thanks cobb, turns out in the end it was the idler pulley bearing but now i have the new water pump fitted anyone need the old one???

also does belt over tension cause mpg drop cause im only getting 50 now down from 70 and im aware its winter but its a big drop.

Need4Speed · 12-08-2012, 05:22 PM

Did you put your radiator block back in?

whereswally606 · 12-09-2012, 09:01 AM

Not as yet. But I think I might I'm starting to come to the opinion that it was the time of life for the idler bearing and not much to do with the heater block. Don't think it will get me my 20mpg back maybe 10 at most. Gave the car a full grid charge last night since the temp had got milder. Seems better but still not good. Really like the idea of making a 12v engine coolant temp motor to take the load off the engine. Since I have the spare I might reverse engineer it when I get time. Thinking I could run an arduino to monitor ect from my c&c odb2 guage to provide a feedback loop for running the motor for an exact degrees centigrade even one user definable. We shall see.

Need4Speed · 12-09-2012, 10:04 AM

There was a previous post about a guy in Japan that did lots and lots of mods for mpg and one of them was an electric water pump.

whereswally606 · 12-09-2012, 01:36 PM

yeah i saw that, what an amazing effort. I actually first got the idea from Mike dabrowski's website where he is remaking bluebird (blue insight wreck) the water pump pully was fooked so i guess it made even more sense for him to think about electrifying it. As well as the abundance of solar energy from his garage.