Leaky water pump?

[Jess]

I just replaced my water pump in April of last year (Napa part) and I've been noticing this dried coolant on what I think is the weep hole? My coolant bottle has also very clearly been leaking. I thought maybe it was just the cap and since I have a whole spare bottle I swapped caps (didn't have time to swap the whole bottle) but after a 10-15m drive to work it was kind of gurgling and I could see coolant leaking from the bottle. So I'll grab more coolant and swap the bottle after work but should I replace the pump as well? 

 

No overheating problems but I'm making a 9hr drive on Friday and would rather eliminate as many variables as I can lol. 

[cruiser54]

Pressure test the cooling system. That looks like old crap from a thermostat housing leak.

[yxmj]

The pump weep hole is on the bottom....if you have fluid on the to it is coming from somewhere else

[coolwind57]

Looks like a thermostat housing leak to me.  I noticed the same thing on my MJ a couple of weeks ago.  Directly above this stain is your thermostat housing.  I got a bit lucky and tightened my bolts and corrected the slight leak, no sweat.  If that doesn't work for you, remove housing (might as well put in a new thermostat), replace gasket and reinstall.  

 

Yep, weep hole is NOT on top of the water pump.

 

BTW, life is much easier for me now that I have converted to an open cooling system on my 89.  The pressure bottles on the old closed systems are problematic with age.  Caps become issues, the plastic bottle itself becomes weak and leak prone.   What I didn't like mostly, however is that my brain struggled with troubleshooting the closed system.  

 

I can more easily and confidently purge air and figure out issues now that I went to an open system.  One of my favorite modfications since ownership.  You might look into this.

[Jess]

3 hours ago, cruiser54 said:

That looks like old crap from a thermostat housing leak.

That was kind of my first thought but I couldn't clearly see a weak spot around the housing. It's been ages since I replaced the thermostat though so it's probably due. 

 

2 hours ago, coolwind57 said:

BTW, life is much easier for me now that I have converted to an open cooling system on my 89.  The pressure bottles on the old closed systems are problematic with age.  Caps become issues, the plastic bottle itself becomes weak and leak prone.   What I didn't like mostly, however is that my brain struggled with troubleshooting the closed system.  

2

Yeah, I hate this thing and the conversion is definitely on my list of things to do. It's just been working fine for a while and when that happens I forget how much I hate it lol. 

 

Thanks guys