Thread: my poor hot smurf

Well, it was a monumental effort. Massive thanks to my friend Patrick (who isn't on the forum but deserves thanks nonetheless), @gadgetman and @longrange308 for all their help over the weekend and thanks for all the help/comments/assistance on the forum here.
This might get a bit long as I'm kinda quite proud of myself. Bear in mind that this is the first work I've done on my vehicle. Up to this point I have been content to just take it to the garage for work. It has helped that my wife is on maternity leave so the requirement for the truck to be ready in time for monday was .........errrr........ shall we call it negotiable.

So, as everyone knows so far it started with an over heating truck which led me to a rather poorly radiator.


So after posting to the knowledgeable and general good buggers on the forum here, having a chat with a few people (including @gadgetman and @longrange308) and an absolute bucket load of research on the net I made the conscious decision to have a crack at it myself.

The general consensus was to replace the radiator and so after a few prices I nearly settled on a solid price from A1 radiators at $320 + gst for an aftermarket auto radiator. Then a new water pump was suggested as was a quick install since the radiator was already out. So a reasonable price of $149 from Butler Auto Mart got me a new water pump.
A stop at Miles Toyota and $124 later got me a new 72 degree thermostat and gasket plus some toyota red coolant.
Then another chat to @longrange308 and the decision to put in a manual radiator and remove the automatic transmission fluid to a separate cooler was made. So back to A1 for another price and it turns out that the manual version of the radiator would be $420 + gst, however Paul at Burnside Radiators (good bugger!) kept his price at $340 + gst (same as the auto radiator price) and got me one within the hour.
A trip to BNT got me a automatic transmission cooler, some transmission fluid and engine oil etc.

So saturday comes around and after swimming with my daughter, Patrick and I start ripping into it.


Taking the radiator out actually was pretty straightforward in the end and didn't give me too much trouble. Then out came the fan and the belts etc.


Then the water pump................ the water pump..........!!!! Change the water pump they said. It'll be easy they said.
So changing the water pump turns out to be relatively easy........ if the housing is already replaced or in good condition. Since my new one had a different impeller and the inside of the pump looked pretty grotty we really had to change the housing as well. I had already paid for it after all and had a new gasket all ready to go behind it too.
So turns out to replace the housing I had to take off the alternator because the alternator bracket is hung off part of the water pump housing. To get at the alternator properly I had to remove and suspend the a/c pump out of the way. Then I had to get in behind the timing belt. So off comes the cover followed by a crash course in changing the timing belt from an excellent thread on another forum. Align all the notches, compress and remove the tensioner, followed by the pulley. Sat and looked forlornly at the cam pulley hoping it would fall off all by itself............. no joy. Another quick call to @gadgetman and @longrange308 wielded some great advice and a couple helpful tools. Needless to say 5 minutes time on sunday morning resulted in the cam pulley sitting in one hand with a big grin on my face. 10 minutes after that the offending water pump housing was sitting on the bench with the new one preparing to go in.


Turns out putting everything back in was actually reasonably straight forward, one snapped bolt which turned out to be easy to remove. Putting the alternator and a/c pump back in place before remembering to change out the thermostat was a mistake. Since I had the timing belt off already I shot back to Butler Auto Mart and grabbed a new one to replace it (80,000 since it was last changed). The new radiator dropped nicely into place (I probably should have replaced top and bottom hoses but didn't). Had to grab more hose for the ATF cooler and grabbed a new radiator cap and some cooling system flush too. Pulled off the light bar/bumper etc and the ATF cooler was a reasonably straightforward installation.


Add some water and coolant flush to radiator, drain and re-fill the auto trans fluid and good to go. Wife will give it a short drive tomorrow to drop kids off and will drain the fluid and flush again depending on colour. Then add the new coolant and check auto trans fluid level. Will change oil and a oil filter next weekend since we just plain ran out of time.

Kinda hooked now I think. Looks like a couple of CV boots to replace and possibly a leak of something somewhere else in the engine bay. Supposedly the front suspension may need replacing soonish............ the possibilities are endless.

Once again, big thanks to everyone.

Cheers, Rhys