I'm Thinking I Need a Water Pump

[98 Contour]

My Contour is starting to give the same symptoms my wife's did right before the water pump went. The coolant light is coming on randomly while driving, so I'm going to replace the pumpo for piece of mind. Where do you guys get the metal impellar pumps? Is there anywhere local I cab try? Thanks for the help.
Chris

 

[LUCA]

I got mine at NAPA.

 

[I8RICE]

napa is the spot to get the pump but your prob mite be that the coolant is just low in the over flow cantainer there is a sensor in there that will through the light on just make sure it is over full by maybe a half inch above the max line.

 

[98 Contour]

Wow, that was fast, thanks for the quick replies!:laugh:

I'll take a look at the overflow, and add coolant if needed. I drive this car to Allentown everyday, and with the weather getting warmer I'm getting increasingly scared of being stuck on 78 in the middle of rush hour.

Christine, is the NAPA pump the metal one, or plastic?

 

[LUCA]

Metal. I told the guy that I wanted the metal impeller WP and that's what I got.
I actually bought two of them at NAPA.

Have you turned on the heat to see if it's working?

 

[98 Contour]

Metal. I told the guy that I wanted the metal impeller WP and that's what I got.
I actually bought two of them at NAPA.

Have you turned on the heat to see if it's working?

Heat works fine, car is running ok. I'm considering this as a preventive measure. My wife's Contour was doing the exact same thing when the pump failed and left her stranded on 380. Plus, I read on this site that it's common for these pumps to fail after 60,000 miles, and my car has 73,000, so my days are numbered. I drive my car 100 miles per day, so I just want to take care of this before I have a problem.

How expensive was the pump, and does it include the housing as well?

 

[BrApple]

How expensive was the pump, and does it include the housing as well?

if you get it from Ford you get the housing and hoses and it was about $80 when I last ordered one ...

from a parts store you are only going to get the pump itself with a gasket.

 

[TGO]

napa is the spot to get the pump but your prob mite be that the coolant is just low in the over flow cantainer there is a sensor in there that will through the light on just make sure it is over full by maybe a half inch above the max line.

+1. mine used to do that a lot, especially when cold. added some coolant and was fine.

not saying it can't be the WP, but it wasn't on mine. if it was gonna fail you'd probably notice increased running temps...considering it's the plastic impellers that fail and will not circulate coolant as well.

i never changed my pump...with 105k when i sold it, plus whatever the next 2 owners put on it, and it never went bad. i'm either lucky or i had a metal impeller pump from the factory, which i doubt. or it was changed sometime before i bought it.

either way, it's probably just a finicky sensor.

 

[99Mystique ATX]

At some point they revised the pump to fix the issue with the impeller breaking. On my 95 I had the impeller break. Fixed it with a cheap one from RockAuto because I was selling it. When I got that one, the quality of it looked very good so when I needed one for the SVT because it was leaking I got another one.

So far so good on both cars. I don't know about the 95 because I sold it but last I knew it was fine.

Like was said, check the coolant level. Fill it up past the max line to make the light go out. As long as its not overheating and the waterpump is not leaking coolant, the wp is fine.

 

[98 Contour]

Thanks for the advice everyone. I checked the coolant level, and it's a hair under the max line, so I'll fill it a little more this weekend (when I finally get a day off).

Thanks again!

 

[LUCA]

I fill mine to the TOP of the word MAX on the coolant tant and haven't had issues since.

If the heat is working I would suspect, at this time, that it's the coolant sensor being finicky.

 

[98 Contour]

I fill mine to the TOP of the word MAX on the coolant tant and haven't had issues since.

If the heat is working I would suspect, at this time, that it's the coolant sensor being finicky.

Yeah, I was hoping that's all it is. Well, good that's one issue resolved. Now to fix that annoying headlight flicker...........

 

[TGO]

At some point they revised the pump to fix the issue with the impeller breaking. On my 95 I had the impeller break. Fixed it with a cheap one from RockAuto because I was selling it. When I got that one, the quality of it looked very good so when I needed one for the SVT because it was leaking I got another one.

yeah, i believe it was late 1999...my car had a build date of 12/3/98, and was an early build number too.