so, the "water pump" that I thought was leaking ... Was really not any sort of water pump at all, it was just the ONLY thing I could possibly think was responsible for a drip by that side of the engine ...

But tonight, at a red light, revving the engine a bit (4000-5000 rpm) a POP sound goes off, and very very nontasty steam came in the car, since it smelled so ... foul (not like sweet sweet antifreeze) i thought it was a fire and opened the hood ... no fire?

Drove home (2 blocks from 'break down point')

Car is on Ramps now, I pour water in, water pours out... I look under neath, puzzled beyond belief

I finally see it... red chord goes to it .. (my lil block heater pos wire! aha!) ... and its just sort of hanging there... expecting to be plugged into something that isn't there any more...

Frost plug, my nemesis, you have cheated me out of 17 dollars for irontite!

So, uhm, now that im buying a frost plug tomorrow ... do I need a fair bit of clearance to hammer the fucker in, or is it possible to do it in a tight space? (and by tight space, I mean I can _PROBABLY_ get my hand up there ... maybe)

wouldn't you know it? Its RIGHT behind the turbo... *sighs*

Btw, I keep thinking ... did this happen because I upped the boost to 10 psi from 8 psi? is this my fault? should I feel bad? or is it just ... well, shit happens when a car has 345000 km on it?

Thanks guys, I needed to vent a bit


- Rasmus

To install a frost plug, you need pretty good access from directly in front, plus it really should be clean and dry when you do.

Buy a block heater and install it. Much easier, since the captive force comes from a nut & bolt.

I agree 100%, install a block heater, much easier.
... and no, increasing the boost will not cause this

Block heater it is, thanks guys!

*much love!*


- Rasmus

Unless you created a head gasket leak.

which could make sense, boost pressurizing the coolant system ... however, this just sort of happened while revving, no real boost involved (in fact, none at all? heh) - I think revving it like two three times must've just rocked the boat a bit (in terms of accelerating and decelerating the water pump's flow) - and that was the straw that mangled the poor camels back and shins.

- Rasmus

You've probably got one of the cheaper water pumps with the sheetmetal blades that tends to overpressurize at higher rpms. same thing happened to me on my old 242.
Not much you can do without upgrading pumps except make sure your plugs are in good and tight!

thats to bad raz, no worries my moms 740 used to do that all the time, the block heater would blow out at high rpms, when it first happend i almost peed my pants thinking i had blown the engine. Let me know if u need help sometime next week, ill be around assembling the engine.

Matt, Athal and I have all blown out our block heaters over revving with those cheap replacement waterpumps... Get a real one if you can afford it...

This was on his Mazda, remember.

went to Auto Value and bought a new block heater and put her in there nice and tight (not more than the ~15 inch lbs of torque they reccomneded thoe) sealed around it with high temp silicone and aluminum powder, worked like a charm... even made it out the race city to run some 1/4!