The couple of leaks I have been dealing with over the past year, the power steering fluid leak up at the pump and the coolant leak at the front water bridge, have both been fixed.
The power steering leak was coming from the o-ring located on the bracket on top of the pump (where the remote reservoir hose attaches). When I pulled the bracket I found the o-ring to be hard and brittle. Replaced with a new o-ring, dried the area as best I could and reassembled the bracket. It has been two days now and I have not observed any leaking from that spot. I was able to get under the car and clean up some of the residual power steering fluid left on the bottom of the pump, alternator and steering rack. Hopefully no other leaks from the pump exist and cleaning these areas should allow me to spot any right away.
As for the front coolant bridge. I had replaced the o-ring on the module which goes to the thermostat but it appears that when I installed it, the o-ring did not slip all the way into place and became pinched, eventually rupturing and causing some of the leaking down the side of the engine as well as into the valley (will be a big clean-up job for the underbody of the car, especially around the adapter plate and bell housing of the transmission where much of the coolant ran down out of the valley). This time I cleaned up both the module and the hole where it press fits into since there was corrosion evident on both and also applied water pump/coolant rated silicone RTV to the area where the ring would seat on the module.
Last, the o-ring on the hard line which press fits into the back of the water pump housing was finally replaced. This was a known bad gasket. It had torn during the original installation and I did not have a spare at the time, only some handy silicone gasket maker. This area was cleaned, a new o-ring fitted, and again some water pump/coolant rated silicone RTV was used on the area.
Although this work has finally solved the leaks, it seems to have generated a new problem. After reassembly of the lower and upper intake manifolds and all other supporting components and wire connections, I now have what almost seems like a miss but not quite. The exhaust note sounds different, with the note change seeming to originate from the passenger side of the engine, possibly even at the cylinder by the firewall.
I thought at first it might be the spark plug wires and when I checked, the first wire I pulled left its electrode on the spark plug. The internal wires practically disintegrated into grey powder! Upon replacing the wires with a new set, the problem still exists. Next I am going to start pulling plugs on the passenger side. I already pulled the plug which had the faulty spark plug wire and it appeared to be ok, but this is closest to the front of the engine and the new note does not seem to be coming from the front.
Power seems to be nearly the same with roll off happening maybe slightly lower in the rpm range than before but it could just be in my head and the different exhaust note playing games with what I feel, acceleration-wise.
Would an injector not firing, or firing too long produce this result? How about a plug not firing? I thought at first it was an exhaust leak up near the manifold but there are no significant leaks around the area (can feel a small amount of leakage around the exit of the manifold where it joins the exhaust pipe) and this new condition only started happening after removing the LIM and UIM. I have also pulled the codes from the ECU but the three existing codes are ones which have always existed (27, 29, 42), nothing new found here which would help diagnose the problem.
I have been over the manifolds and all wiring and hose connections to them and have not found any issues yet which is why I am bringing this to the forum to get some input from others who may have suggestions I have not checked yet.
