Jeff and Eric,
             The  main causes of waterpump failure is
almost always too much belt tension.   Some failure
can occur because of poor lubrication by the use of
old coolant or water without antifreeze.
    Eric has a good point but I think it is a bit
extreme to soak the waterpump for 24 hours.
The seal does not swell but more likely the seal can
burn if you run the waterpunp in a dry condition.   A
few turns of the waterpump by hand after adding
coolant to the tank is all that is needed.   If you
want to do it eric's way just bleed the next day or 24
hours later.   gary
Date:    Thu, 15 Jul 2004 07:26:22 -0400
From:    Eric Zeno <vw4x4@FYI.NET>
Subject: Re: Weeping water pump and driver

99.999999999% of all water pumps on vanagons are
install wrong.
IF you read the instructions that came with the pump,
it states
to soak the pump in anti-freeze for 24 hours before
installing.
This is important to insure the seal does not leak
prematurely!
There is an easy way of doing this.  Install the pump
dry, fill
with anti-freeze, and before starting, let it sit for
two days. Most
mechanics will not do this only because they can not
afford the time.

ERic

Jeff Oxroad wrote:

>I replaced my water pump with a genuine VW water pump
about 4 years
and
>30,000+ miles ago. It seems to be weeping coolant
through the weep
hole. Enough so
>that it dimished the coolant level in the overflow
tank. Lets say it
lost
>about 2 cups of coolant.
>
>Seems a rather short run for the water pump--is it?.
The bus does sit
>sometimes for a month at a time. Would this make the
water pump life
shorter? I mean
>c'mon, I just did this job, relatively.
>
>Is some weeping normal? How much time so I have
before it needs
>attention--any?
>
>(FWIW the VWOA water pump I got from VW was from
Italy--I think it
said
>remanufactured in Italy and went for about $110 for
the part from what
I remember.
>Remember when VW parts were made in germany and
lasted?)
>
>TIA
>Jeff
>83.5 Westfalia
>LA,CA
>

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