1992 240 w/140K miles. Starting to get a slight weep of coolant on exhaust side about a 1/2 inch back from water pump. I cleaned off the area and looked with a mirror and it is wet where the head and block meet. What are my options?Can I re-torque the head, smear something on the area or pour a stop leak into radiator? Any help appreciated.

My 86 240 with about 250K miles started doing this one summer, but the coolant wasn't flowing back from the WP. I retorqued the head and the problem went away for a month or so. When it came back I removed the cylinder head and found that some of the aluminum had been etched away near cylinder #1. I put some gasket sealer in the corroded area and replaced the gasket. It hasn't leaked again in the last 70K miles. I don't know what caused the cylinder head to corrode like that.

A couple of the replies have mentioned it - but to emphasize: the odds are 10-to-1 that it is the seal between the pump and the head. Then the leaked coolant "wicks" its way backward along the head/block joint to imitate a leaking head gasket. If you can manage to find a shop with a cooling system pressure tester that will fit the cap on your reservoir, great. That should enable you to track it down.

The water pumps on these cars are pretty much a maintenance item, so if you don't know when last replaced, do it now. You are about halfway into the labor of a timing belt replacement at this point, so there's another might-as-well.

I REALLY don't like the "Stop-Leak" type of products. Too many stories of heater cores that worked OK before, not at all after.
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Bob (81-244GL B21F, 83-244DL B23F, 94-944 B230FD plus grocery-getter Dodge minivan, MGB, and numerous old motorcycles)

The only stop-leak to work for me is GM part number 3634621 for $4.09. I buy it from the Chevy dealer. There's like six silver dollar sized tablets in the package you break up and put in the radiator. This stuff completely desolves and does gum up the heater core. If you pull the head, consider a valve job. jp

make sure the seal on top of the pump is ok, otherwise, sounds like the head gasket is gone. seen it a few times and nothing short of replacement will fix it. good luck, chuck.

Jim,


When I've had the main shaft seal start leaking on my Bricks water pumps ... coolant leaked out of the weep hole on the front under side of the pump. It would run back along the block. Reach in behind the back side of the W/P pulley ..feel along the under side of the very front end of the pump for coolant. Or use your mirror and a light to look closely at the under side of the pump for signs of coolant. Check the black, mushroom seal at the top water pump. It seals the pump to head. A leak there is common and would release coolant into the area you've described. Also the orange metal return line that runs along the side of the block and into the back of the pump has a circular seal that can leak and spray coolant in that same area. Make sure you don't have a water pump seal leak. Hope this helps.

ther is a rubber seal between water pump and cylinder head. common failure on these engines. check it!
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i prefer non-german cars