Thread: Replacing Thermostat?

True, but after a certain mileage it is wise to replace it as a good insurance policy.

He said his coolant is not exactly pristine looking, this is a good indication that the PO neglected the cooling system overall. If he's got rust in his cooling system from neglect, well.. that's not exactly easy on a water pump anyway.

That's the main reason why i recommend it. Might as well get it all over with. You can do it incrementally, but it's more expensive and time consuming to do so. If it were my car and i discovered crappy looking coolant in it, i'd replace every cooling system part at once. But that's just me.

WP is a terrible pain especially if you have big fat hands. If I had to do a wp I'd literally drop the motor a few inches.
If the coolant has oil in it its head gasket but you might just have a whole mess of corrosion. I'd flush the motor with the garden hose in the upper coolant housing and watch what comes out.

How so? It's 2 different processes. The only thing that has to be done twice is coolant drain/refill. I'm sure it's worth the extra $5 and 5min to just do the t-stat first and see. While I agree it's a good idea to do the pump when you can, doing it with the engine in the car is far from that. It's a true pain. Unless he's already messing around on that side or has the engine out, I'd only suggest it if it's truly bad.

Well, if you've got rust or some other contaminant in your coolant you can either do the repair now or some thousand miles down the road, know what i mean?

I guess that's just my attitude. I only fix things completely. It is safe to assume that on a 10-20 year old car, everything is ready to go. So, might as well fix it before it leaves you stranded.

Well regardless, dude needs to find out what the hell is in his coolant. That is most important of all.

As stated, do the tstat. Just make sure you use a nissan tstat. The aftermarket ones are crap. I've done my tstat twice and used aftermarket ones and it's still not heating up like it should. I've got a factory tstat sitting in my tool box but I haven't got around to doing it a third time.

And yes the waterpump is a huge pain in the ass. Mine finally gave out after 205k, and I honestly hope my new one last at least another 205k cause I really don't want to do it again. While doing the pump I was basically one motor mount away from the engine and tranny falling out of the car

Holy crap, LS. That's basically where i'm at. I have 4 new OEM Nissan mounts waiting to be installed and the car vibrates like a jackhammer right now.

All my mounts are shot, but what can I expect for a 20 year old car with 210k on it I'm waiting to do the mounts until I get my new clutch and flywheel.

Probably next weekend I'm going to do, 4 mounts, clutch/flywheel, new tranny, new condenser(OEM tstat while the coolants drained), recharge the AC, driver axle, and hopefully new struts and springs. Then my car should be good for a while until I decide to pull the rack and completely redo the ps system

Not really looking forward to working on my own car and not getting payed

Let us know how that works out. I've got 3 mounts actually and am still waiting on the transmission mount from Nissan.. apparently very hard to get... grrrr...

Uh, i went to replace the thermostat(400k engine) and notice it is leaking fluid were the water pump is. If the coolant was low would it heat up exponentially after five minutes? Ultimately it looks like i need a new water pump if it is leaking. MMM dont think i should put more money into it the motor leaks oil too.

yep, sounds like water pump time unfortunately. Probably have a bad pump or the gasket tore and it's leaking that way. Either way, it's pump R&R time, which sucks.