85 Riviera 307 water pumps

[Guest Straight eight]

Well, the old girl at 37000 miles started leaking from the weep hole in the water pump. She's a '85 Rivie with the 307 V8 with air conditioning.

Question:

Any feed back on the NAPA NEW water pump? Is anything out there any better? They have a lifetime warranty.

Any tips in replacing?

Edited September 21, 2009 by Straight eight (see edit history)

[NTX5467]

A "new" water pump from an aftermarket source will be a new housing, in addition to what you might otherwise get with a quality reman pump. In some cases, there might be a little more room around the bolt heads or other minor differences that might make it different from the OEM pump.

To me, about the only thing you'll be getting is a new pump housing for a higher price. Personally, I'd rather have a FACTORY casting pump which was remanned by a reputable rebuilder. Just tell the parts person you want one that's on the factory GM casting, then request to look until you find one like that.

ONE observation about NAPA, O'Reilley and possibly some other auto supply parts. Over the years, the number of national parts rebuilders has dwindled as the smaller ones were bought out by the larger ones, or otherwise closed up. Therefore, doing some shopping can reveal different pricing for the same part at different parts retailers.

Start your shopping at RockAuto.com. Their listings usually have several companies available to shop from. Then note the part number for A-1 Cardone AND the placement of the "-" in the part number. My observations have been that if you THEN check the Napa Parts Online website for the same part, you'll find the same A-1 Cardone part number has the same number sequence in the part number as the NAPA part number, BUT the location of the dash "-" is different. A-1 Cardone would be XX-XXXX and NAPA would be XXX-XXX, for example. NAPA's price is usually a few dollars higher to compensate for the part being in THEIR packaging. THESE are my observations and ONLY work if the O'Reilly part and NAPA part are sourced from A-1 Cardone.

In NAPA Exhaust, they used to not be quite so secretive. The NAPA part number was the same as Walker Exhaust's part number.

So, shop around and see what you think. I believe that NAPA might have several different warranty levels, which prices reflecting those differences, which might be an advantage as long as you keep your "purchase documentation" and meet other possible warranty requirements. Your judgment call.

You're probably going to find lots of vacuum hoses and such on that engine. Once you get them out of the way, it should "fix" just like any other Oldsmobile V-8.

Just some thoughts,

NTX5467