1950s 1959 Cadillac water pump

[Cadillac Jack 82]

Welp my water pump took a dump last weekend.  Luckily it happened when she was being serviced for a coolant exchange.  I have a new rebuilt pump from Caddy Daddy along with the components coming this week.  I have the torque specs too for the shop but I'm curious....are there any other pointers I can give the shop before they install the new pump?

[Gabe Davis]

I will say that in doing that job it became a whole lot of "might as well"s.

About 10 years ago it was time for a new pump. The original was leaking from the weep hole. To get it out all of the accessories had to come off. Well that is all apart, "might as well..." So the power steering pump needed a little refresh. And the fan. And the pullys. And the oil filter canister. And the valve covers. And, why not, we are here, the intake. Oh, that's off? Do the valley cover too. And the dipstick for the trans. The breather tube. The distributor. It became an entire top of the engine refresh for me. "Might as well.."

I got my new water pump from Kanter. Hit it with a lot of brake parts cleaner to remove the protective oil from the bare cast iron. Then hit it with some self etching primer and finally the correct Bill Hirsch Cadillac Dark Blue:

https://www.hirschauto.com/AEROSOL-ENGINE-ENAMEL/productinfo/EEA-SPRAY/CAD%20DK%20BLU/

Fortunately, I did not encounter any weirdness with stuck bolts or stripped threads. Everything went back together well and I did not have any leaks.

I was very pleased with the results. The engine bay looks great now. I'm very glad I said "might as well" and went through the effort.

[David King (kz78hy)]

Get a piece of cardboard and draw an outline of the pump mounting flange.  when you remove the bolts, insert them in the cardboard in the proper location.  The bolts are varying in lengths, and this eliminates getting the wrong ones in the incorrect locations.  Also, I made up 4 studs to temporally screw into the block when loading the water pump back to the block.  Those 4 gaskets like to fall off or not stay aligned during the load, at least I struggled with it.  Once in place and snuggled with a couple of the bolts in other holes, remove the studs and insert the proper bolts.

[Cadillac Jack 82]

Thanks for the information!  I'm also very pleased to see that Hirsch has rattle cans back of the Cadillac blue!!!

[David Greenburg]

X2 for keeping track of the bolts and using threaded stock to make "pins" to hold the pump in place. Not much fun to start all over because one of the gaskets slipped out of position.

[Cadillac Jack 82]

Cant seem to post a photo but I wanna thank Caddy Daddy for the mint rebuilt pump they sent me in a rush.  They painted it correctly and its a clean core. 

[Grant Owen]

A word of warning , 1959 water pumps are different to 1960-1962 . The body casting is different due to the oil filter housing, using a different casting other than 1959 will result in incorrect pulley alignment with its associated problems & premature bearing wear.

[Cadillac Jack 82]

All fixed! Slight drip from the lower hose but a quick tightening of a hose clamp fixed that.

[60eldo]

Does anyone know the casting # for 59 with A/C and without A/C, also 0n 60