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Boxster S 987.1 water pump, is it an easy DIY ? Now complete

kurlykris

Well-known member
Joined
30 Jun 2014
Messages
2,965
Nightmare car week for me, Mercedes is stuck on the drive waiting for new discs and pads all round, parts on thier way !

So, have been using the Boxster for work :D

I jumped in her to go to work this morning and she sounded grumpy, dry bearing noise behind me by the sounds of it, so threw my tools and whatnot in the 911 and off I went down to a job in Evesham :D

I got home and for the first time ever for me, I put the hood in service position and removed the Bose Sub, carpet bits and access panels to have a gander at the pulleys and belt. Car sounded fine when I started her up, so switched off and dropped the serpentine belt off, had a feel of the ancillary pulleys and tensioner pulley, all fine, but the water pump was all but hanging off, I can waggle the pulley from side to side by about 5mm :eek:

So, the question is, do I DIY it or put it back together and limp to my local German car specialist ?
Will I have a nightmare burping the cooling system if I replace the pump myself ?
I looks a very small and tight space to work to be honest and as the car is due a service and they have to get all the access panels off to do that, should I just get them to change it during the service :?:

Dirty engine :nooo:

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Young man .. its pretty easy :D

You should have no trouble .. but the labour cost will be around the 1.5 - 2.0 hour mark if you want to get it done whilst its in for a service .

You do it from inside mainly .. theres x1 bolt thats a little tricky and thats n/s and the lower one ... other than that its straight forward .

The new gasket and you cut off the oil pump part .. it comes complete .

Edit for bleeding ..

Fill it up , have someone rev it at 3k rpm and keep topping it till its full ( bleed valve open ).. screw the cap back on BEFORE they drop the revs .

R/t then leave and check in the morning .. top up and you should be sorted.

I would then put the bleed valve back to position and refit the cover over it .
 
I`ve watched a few Youtube videos Iain, looks fairly straighforward, it just looks like quite a tight space to work in :grin:

The irony is that I`ve been meaning to change the water pump on the 996 for the last 12 months as a precaution @109K but haven`t got round to it, the Boxster only has 60K on the clock :nooo:

I`m going to give it go, it`s about time I got the " but it`s a Porsche " thing out of my head :thumb:

I`m going to get her bum in the air to make things easier, should I bleed the system while shes up in the air, or on level ground :?:
 
Thats the spirit :thumb:

Its a challenge !

It is tight in a sense .. but im only little so i fit behind the seat :eek: ..

If it is too small a space then you can remove the front seat .. only 4 bolts at the end of the day .

Bleeding .. well there are many opinions on here .. all i can say is i do it on the flat , bleed valve open and reving whilst filling .

Bear in mind the bleed valve is under a cover .. you remove this then oil cap on , rev up and fit the coolant cap when its stopped bubbleing or the lvl looks ok... r/t .

You check the following day or when its cooled down and at that point you refit the cover .

Its a bit different if you have replaced the rads as thats where you get air locks .. in that case a vacumn bleeder is best Imho .


Boxster is easier than a 996 , lack of room inside yes but a 996 is best done on a ramp .. plus you have to move the engine brace bar back so engine supported is best .. and you get covered in coolant if on the floor :p

EDIT ... only use mechanics normally see the engine and we dont care if its dirty or not :D
 
Not sure if you changed your pump, I'm in the middle of doing mine on my 987. Also changing to a LTT whilst in there.
Couple of bolts tricky to access removing and just as tricky to refit.
Replaced the front coolant pipes also, so sounds like bleeding could be fun.
 
So,finally,after about 6 weeks of life getting in the way (a 2 week bout of Salmonella and 3 weeks of Manflu ) Yesterday I got around to fitting the new waterpump on the Boxster. I had already removed the Bose subwoofer from the parcel shelf, carpeting and access covers to the engine to investigate the problem, so all I had to do was fit the new waterpump and try and remember how it all went back together !
I jacked the car up at the rear and set the wheels down on 2 4" Thermalite breezeblocks to give me a slightly better access to underneath and remove the undertray, what a complete pain in the bum that is with only about 6 inches between it and the ground !
My driveway slopes away from the house towards the road and also across the property, so axle stands are a bit iffy to my mind, so I have to improvise for the sake of safety.

I cut a large plastic storage bin down to about 5 inches in height, but with enough capacity to catch 25 litres of coolant if required, slid it underneath the waterpump area, then undid the bolts holding the waterpump slightly, took off the stupid spring hose clamp and tried to prise the pipe off the pump, no joy whatsoever in moving that from underneath the car, so I took all of the bolts out and placed them into a cardboard gasket shape I had made earlier, as 2 of them are longer than the others, and the pump popped off without any trouble and 99% of the coolant that came out was saved in the plastic bin ! I reckon I lost about a cup full.
Once the pump was free, I wrestled with the coolant hose for about half an hour and it eventually came off the pump !
Removed the pump from inside the car and interestingly the gasket came with it, I didn`t need to cut it away from the oil pump gasket, which should be part of the single piece gasket. After wiping down the mating face I ran a very fine file around the outer edge, as I could feel a build up of crud around the housing, just to be sure of a nice clean gasket seal.
The gasket is metal with a pressed in radiused indentation in the middle which crushes to form the seal, so no gasket goo is required, and it holds itself onto the waterpump on 2 protruding metal spigots on 2 of the bolt holes, so doesn`t fall off when you have to awkwardly offer the pump into position pretty much blindly as you fiddle to get the first bolt in with your other hand. Popped all of the other bolts in and tightened them up gently in sequence, going round a couple of times using a 10mm combination spanner on some, 1/4 inch ratchet on others and a deep socket on a 3/8 inch ratchet for the awkward one closest to the oil pump.
The coolant was then decanted from the tray into some 5 litre containers filtered through an industrial wiper in the home made ( top half of a Robinsons squash bottle) funnel to filter out the bits of crud that came out when it was draining.
I did this predominantly so I could measure how much coolant came out so I would know if I had filled the system up fully and didn`t have an air lock when it was up to max level. On filling the system back up, the 8 litres that had drained out went straight back in with the engine not running and the burp valve open, then I topped up about another half litre to max level, closed the burp valve, put my tools away, then went down the pub !

Got home from work about 4 this afternoon and decided to get the boxster finished and back on the road.
The serpentine belt looks as though it is new, so I decided to re-use it, although I will change it on the service that is due shortly. Popped the key in the ignition and she started on the first turn with a nice cloud of smoke,having been sat for about 6 weeks :grin:
Heater turned up to max and let her come up to temperature, checked the coolant level, all good, no air locks.
Put all the access panels back on, carpets in, Bose subwoofer back in, roof clips and bits and bobs back in place, all good.

Then the Nemesis, the undertray, what a real pain in the backside these are to fathom out at arms length and 6 inches of room under the car, but on she went.

Sadly I couldn`t take her for a spin as she is blocked in by the 911 and the bloody battery was dead on that after 2 weeks of sitting idle. The battery is on charge as I type this, so will have to give them both a damn good thrashing tomorrow night.

The hardest parts of this job ?
Unplugging the Bose subwoofer as the cable is so short and the plug is really awkward to get your fingers on and release from the socket, it probably took me 45 minutes to do it.
The Undertray and figuring out which screws and retaining nuts need to be removed to get it off, the nut right in the middle of the car down a 40 mm square hole took me a while to figure out, then trying to slot it all back into place correctly to bolt it back on.

Would I do it again, hell yes :thumb:
 
It's a yes from me.

Job satisfaction from a job jobbed by yours truly is a special feeling.
 
Yep Marty, there is no better feeling than getting the job done by yourself :thumb:

After finishing the job on the Thursday, I got home early on the Friday, took her for a 30 minute run, topped off the coolant by about 100ml, threw my weekend bag in the frunk and drove the 130 miles down to the girlfriends house and all was well :grin:

They are just cars afterall, nothing special to worry about if you do your homework and take your time to make sure you don`t make a stupid mistake :thumbs:
 
Impressive stuff, I like to get my hands dirty on the basics like brakes, ARBs and light fixes. But then, I have support from Demort and a very handy mate.

Not sure I'd have the minerals to do the water pump solo, even if I do have the small hands!

And to then throw in a long run, solid work! :thumb:
 
The return of Marty Wild said:
Impressive stuff, I like to get my hands dirty on the basics like brakes, ARBs and light fixes. But then, I have support from Demort and a very handy mate.

Not sure I'd have the minerals to do the water pump solo, even if I do have the small hands!

And to then throw in a long run, solid work! :thumb:

Yes it was a bit of a risk/educated decision to immediately drive a 260 mile round trip :grin:

But then again, I am a self employed professional engineer, so I have to have faith in my workmanship :grin:

As I say to some of my customers, I could get a job doing this :floor:

deMort, we would be lost without your support on 911uk, you truly are a diamond :thumb:
 
I once jumped in my Mk3 VR6 after a rather expensive engine rebuild all set for a 120 mile trip. Only for me to not buy into the oil temp readings I was getting.

Engine popped on the M11, game over. Water pump went, pretty much the only part I hadn't had replaced.

All manners of lessons learnt on that one! :lol:

Demort is 911uk for me :thumb:
 

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