Should I re-use this water pump housing?

For fun, I let the housing soak for another day in the citric acid. I scrubbed vigorously and cleaned all the threads before I put it back in the acid. I wanted to see how well it could come back. Didn’t look too bad!

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Looks fine to me. Make sure you run a bottle of rust inhibitor along with your green coolant; you should be fine.
 
Crazy how the citric acid can eat away at years of nasty rust!

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After paint

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I took both housings to the local engine shop because I wanted to have my later one machined to my factory housing’s specs (5/8 pipe, shorter ear for AC bracket.) The old one would have been a template for them to go off of.

The shop is “EngineTech Machine” here in Santa Maria. Very reputable and they build TOP NOTCH motors. Looking at both housings, he said the one off the NY'er is perfectly fine. He’d actually rather use the one I have now versus the other. Although the other has “less pitting,” the machined face is a lot thinner! He said that because my motor is close to stock and it’s not a race car, the pump housing will be just fine.

I still may swap it out for a better unit in the future, but he said that there shouldn't be any reason to worry about running it. Cool! Saved me some money...
 
Mild organic acids w or w/o electrolysis can do marvels cleaning up rusted iron! When current gets added with the RIGHT electrolyte, metal may even be restored or plated. Hmmm, some nice COPPER plating that pump housing might be worth the effort, what little there is. Copper would protect the underlying iron, dissipate heat even more evenly and such. I might try this on one of my old iron housings.

My faves are the early ones, though alas! I busted an ear off the thermostat flange on the one '65/66 housing I have. Fortunately, some stuff earmarked for 440Source hit the market then, and I scored an Al housing accoutered with the same old ears, an extra bolt hole to permit its use with later model brackets, but otherwise features a form very close to the old Mopar housings. I checked the return ports when a well meaning soul mentioned that much chinesium got cast with undersized return ports to the block, but this one measured out just fine. I still want to return to iron, someday....
 
After looking at that housing, I'd be more worried about how borked up the cooling passages are within the block than worrying about the housing!

Thankfully the motor has been completely rebuilt!
And they were too lazy to do anything to the housing, WTF? That makes me wonder what corners they cut building the motor? Good Luck


That looks like a Pontiac color to me!
 
And they were too lazy to do anything to the housing, WTF? That makes me wonder what corners they cut building the motor? Good Luck



That looks like a Pontiac color to me!

I removed the water pump housing before sending the motor. I just had the machine work done to it and the long block assembled.

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How they received it. I sent the intake too, but it’s removed here. Never sent them the water pump housing.
 
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That looks like a Pontiac color to me!
C'mon man! Who has a stock lowrider?

I'm anxious to see the end result. Isaiah had a vision, and he's sticking to it, regardless of what anyone thinks.

It does look like a Pontiac color in that pic though.
 
I replaced mine with an aluminum piece. Think I got it on ebay but don't remember for sure. Was reasonably priced and saves weight. Did this with several parts (intake, accessory brackets, sanden compressor, radiator, electric fan, etc). Probably saved 125+ lbs doing this. Eliminating weight helps with these big boats. Eventually plan on aluminum Edelbrock heads, that will save another 60-75 lbs and improve heat dissipation so I can possibly advance the timing more.

Since the engine rebuild and these changes I did notice a significant improvement in the slam you back into the seat factor when stomping on the gas.
 
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