Alright on my 6.9l i told yall i would be working on changing the tstat water pump and installing a coolant filter.
Well i took the water pump off today and heres what i found.
Taking all of the bolts out some came out dry just a little rust and others came out completely black with oil and smelled exactly like tar.
Not sure if this is normal or not this is my first water pump.
I have oil leaking all down the sides maybe from the oil file tube or the front engine cover if there is such a thing, take a look at the pics i have one of some crappy lookin stuff insde the oldwater pump and some pics of all the oil runs and the surface on the block where the pump mounts.would like to fix anythinga nd everyhthing i can while i'm right there at it.

 

Looks to me like your timing chain cover is.leaking and since your that far in it id chain the timing chain imo

 

One more thing! Here is what i could get of the inside of my radiator after draining all the coolant. I'm no radiator expert but that looks a little rough?
sort of corroded?
I had asked a question previously being that since my fan kicks on when i first start the truck and then dies off once i held it at idle for maybe 5-10 minutes, meaning my fan clutch worked. But i have heard that your radiator has to be working in order for your clutch to work because it is based on air flow??
So... what do yall think about this radiators health?

 

Anyone else second the timing chain cover+timing chain?

 

Often the more you tear into a thing the more you'll find potentially wrong. If it was mine I'd just clean it up and put a new water pump on it and be done with it. Unless you are losing a lot of oil and/or leaving puddles, but then you'd better find exactly where it's coming from other than just throwing parts at it. I guess it all comes down to how much time and money you want to put in it.
A radiator shop can clean that radiator up or tell you if it's too far gone to bother.

 

The oil in the bolts are a sure sign of a timing chain gasket failure as well as the chocolate milk there. Sw pend the.extra bucks remove.bout.6 more bolts.and change out the.timing chain and gaskets. Why have to pay for gaskets again later down tbe road and have to pull that brand new pump back off and do the chain. Your already.there

 

okay. i'll go ahead and do that, you don't have to pull the crank pulleys or drain the oil when you take the timing cover off? don't want oil splattering everywhere?
Also just pulled out my old t-stat annnnd it looks nothing like my new one from motorcraft? motorcraft one has a black rubber housing on the bottom where it sits in its home and the one i pulled out just has the large brass circle on top that rests in the indention for it.

 

That means someone in the past put in a cheap-o T-Stat.

And yes to the above, you'll pull the harmonic balancer to get that timing cover off. You'll probably have to have someone time it once it's back together and you'll most likely end up changing the oil.

I don't think the IDI has the bottom of the timing cover as the mating surface of the oil pan, but if it does you'll have to reseal that too. And speaking of seals you'll want to replace that front oil seal while you have it all apart.

 

i'll have to have what timed?
this is turning into a project haha. if i change the timing chain that is.
and yes there are 2 bolts that mate with the oil pan. but the timing cover also is sort of clamped in using the oil fill tube that has a lip that goes over the timing cover, i assume once i take the harmonic balancer off i can just pull out of the dowel pins at the bottom where it mates with the oil pan and then pull it down out of the lip.
Aynone ever done this?

 

and i actually may have a front oil seal for this engine. tried to order a rear main from rockauto a while back and they sent me the front and it took longer than 30 days for me to get around to trying to put it together and then found out it was the front not the rear, so maybe i'll just dig into it anyways haha

 

Ok, first off, I don't want to offend you because I don't know your background on the 7.3's and 6.9's, but you don't have a clue what you are talking about.

There is NO timing chain on these engines, its straight gears from the crankshaft up to the injection pump.

Secondly, Eallend some of those bolts, I want to say 4, are supposed to be oily, that is completely normal. Those bolts go straight through the cover and are open into the gear train. Because of this, they require thread sealant. Due to some differences in the castings, these bolts are sometimes shorter than the others. If longer bolts are mistaken used, they can bottom out on the IP gear and cause almost instant injector pump failure when the engine is started. That happened to a guy about 2-3 times in a row a few months back. So carefully read the directions with the new pump (if you search here its been posted many times). I want to say its the topmost 2 and the bottommost 2 bolts but please double check.

As for the oil there, it looks like its coming from the top end, valve colvers or IP cover, fuel return lines, or IP leaking into the valley pan and working its way down the front of the engine. I wouldn't worry about it at all, don't bother ripping it apart.

For the radiator, it looks worse than mine, and mine has some nasty growth on the tubes. Sounds like a good time to get it cleaned out, either at home, or at a radiator shop. Not 100% on the fan clutch, but I believe they can lock up initially due to the design. Something about some fluid inside that provides the lockup gets settled when cool. Then has to be pumped out before it releases. If its working right, it needs to sense a lot of heat coming off the radiator before it will lockup.

Again 75Three90, I don't mean to offend you, but I've never seen you post in this diesel forum before and what you posted is completely off base for these engines. It might be fully true for some of the gassers though, I don't have a clue how they are setup.

 

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Unless you pull any of the gears, you will not need to touch the timing. Read what I just posted above and stop what you're doing unless you actually think the front seal is leaking and want to deal with it.

Otherwise you're going to be wasting some time.... I hate misinformation.
I've never tried to touch anything on the front of the motor except the water pump, so I can't say any more about the timing cover or front seal. If you search around I'm sure its been posted before.

 

LOL, solves that problem right there. I should have caught that too.


That's right too, in fact the replacement water pump should have instructions warning about the different bolt lengths.


I'm glad Techgod checked in, he just saved you a bunch of work Eallend.

 

Yeah thanks tecgod, posted my last message before i had time to see yours posted.
The instructions came with warnings about the top 2 bolts, and came with 2 new brass bolts for the top which in comparison to my original ones are the same length, i suppose i should use them then?
So you wouldn't even recommend just taking the timing cover off to see if it's the culprit? I have changed my only skeptical valve cover which was drivers side and torqued them both, they were leaking in the rear but the passengers side i just torqued down again and haven't seen much of any leakage in the rear yet, have had NO leaks out of the front of the valve covers, does look to be a leak around the oil fill tube?