Help with 405 D cooling system leak

Bare knuckles · Post by **Bare knuckles** » 13 Dec 2004, 01:14

Father in Law (who has just started saving for funeral expenses and has a deep scepticism of anything positive in life):
"I've got a drip of water coming from under the car - can you have a look".........
See water is dripping down from above the sump plug. Jack up car and get underneath to see a small unit bolted to the body of the block to which there are 4 water pipes attached. Water seems to be seeping from the general area where the pipes are, or it could be between the unit and the engine block.
Can you help with:
1. What it is I am calling the unit that the 4 pipes go to?
2. Access is very tight - almost impossible to get to from below as drive shaft, exhaust etc in way, and almost impossible from the top as it is mounted too low down to reach. What is the easiest way to get access.
If you cannot help then I will have to get old man to invest in a Haynes Manual. This would clearly have an impact on his funereal savings - and probably accelerate the onset of said expenditure!
Hope you can help as this may restore his faith in human kind and stop him whining about over paid ponces kicking a bag of air around - "Stanley Mathews was my favourite" - help <u>me</u> please..........

beezer · Post by **beezer** » 13 Dec 2004, 01:40

Sounds like the water pump inlet to me. Pig to get to indeed. A bit easier if you remove the drive shaft and lower engine mounting which involves draining gearbox and supporting engine. There is an intermediate driveshaft bearing which is often hard to remove from its housing. The engine mount is part of the same assembly. You can reach so far from the o/s wheel arch after removing the splash guard. You may get by without removing mounting. Probably either the gasket has gone or one of the hoses. Stanley was a fine player indeed. Tom Finney fixed our boiler.

Bare knuckles · Post by **Bare knuckles** » 13 Dec 2004, 02:52

Many thanks for your reply, I think I'll get a gasket and look forward to carrying out as a christmas week project. Cheers Ian

duggie · Post by **duggie** » 14 Dec 2004, 02:28

Hi Ian,
l had this happen to me several years ago, the unit is a pig to get to and is a common problem with the 405, the reason being the unit is made of a composite material that expands and contracts differently to the metal (engine). When l changed mine i had to change the unit itself because it had a crack through it, to make life easier if you support the engine with a trolley jack remove the top and bottom engine mounts and pull the engine forward carefully this should allow you suffient access to the unit.
All the best. Duggie

Bare knuckles · Post by **Bare knuckles** » 14 Dec 2004, 23:02

Thanks for the further info Duggie, it will come in useful. Old man impressed that there are people out there willing to share information - and quickly. "That T'Internet's not s'bad" - which is high praise indeed.
Seasons greetings
Ian

PeanutOil · Post by **PeanutOil** » 16 Dec 2004, 03:57

If you're going to the trouble of taking the water pump inlet bracket off, it would be well worth changing it for a new one. As duggie mentioned, the material they are made from is far from ideal (Sintered aluminium as far as I know) Many 405's have a fuel pre-heater built into this unit, which can be a common point of air ingress when the Sintering fails, and goes porus. A new one is a good idea. If you can be bothered, and can find an early engine in a scrapyard, they were made from cast rather than sintered, and are far better (The sintered parts were introuduced as a cost saving.)