edzolz

My 2006 Buick Lucerne with Northstar has a leaking water pump. My service mechanic can replace it ok, but is this the beginning of the end? There are 123,000 miles on the car with virtualy no problems so far. I don't want to start pumping money into the 11 year old car if it is going to start going downhill. My wife loves the car and it is clean as a pin (always garaged), paint is almost perfect, interior is excellent, just replaced the headlights with new so they have no fading. Really want to keep it unless this is just the beginning of problems. Any thoughts on future reliability.

oldcutlass

Why would a water pump be the kiss of death for her car? Check with the required maintenance schedule and see what the car needs for the amount of miles that are on it. Other than that keep truckin.

1970greensupreme

They are good running engines and will last but expect a few oil leaks that unless your ready to drop the frame/engine out to fix your gonna have to live with. As long as you didn't overheat it the head gaskets should be ok for now. Look under the intake from the front and back to make sure you don't see any coolant in the engine valley.

Olds64

Get rid of it while you can. If you haven't put head studs on it and it has 123k miles it will need them soon. If you keep it either drive it into the ground or have it fixed correctly with a new water pump and head studs.

joe_padavano

The only issues I had when I replaced the water pump on the N* in my Allante were 1) you need the special water pump socket to get it out, 2) you need to use an impact wrench on this special socket, and 3) the housing it fits into was also cracked and needed to be replaced. The housing on mine (a 1993 - first year of the motor) was phenolic.

Funkwagon455

Leaking water pump is not a kiss of death so long as the car has not gotten even a little hot. These are great engines as long as they are kept cool. As soon as they get a little warm and start to "consume" antifreeze, it is all over... The water pumps are not that hard to change and most auto chains have the socket to "rent" to take it out. My best advise,,..keep the engine cool, if you rupture a plastic radiator tank, shutdown as soon as you can safely get the car off of the thoroughfare. Oil leaks, yes typical.. There is a reason it has an 8 quart oil capacity.. The Cadillac dealership service rep told me that the car had a normal oil consumption rate... My response: "Are you serious?, what like a radial aircraft engine!"😳