Good afternoon everyone I am in need of some advice, my water pump failed, and coolant ran down the front of the motor and finding its way onto various pulleys and such and im worried it'll cause trouble down the road, any advice on cleaning it up, its quite thick and some bits have developed a paste like consistency . Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated

 

I may be off the mark, but it sounds like the coolant has mixed with the grease/oil already on your engine block - if so I would have thought a standard engine degreaser would clear it

 

+1

Evaporated coolant often leaves yellow staining but doesn't form a paste by itself. I'd agree with Steve this is probably evaporated coolant on top of some other contaminant on the pulleys etc.

One issue you could have is with drive belts. Once these have had coolant spilled on them, they can begin to squeal on startup. Not serious but very annoying!

Graham

 

Rambunctious, go to your local store and find some stuff called "Simple Green". It is eco friendly and it works pretty good on getting grease and whatnot off of stuff. Get the engine a little warm and then spray this stuff on to the engine and let it drip under the car. From there, you can spray the SIDES!!!!! of your engine (DO NOT SPRAY THE TOP!!!!!!! To do so may lead to misfires galore due to getting water into the plug wells and whatnot). From there, the Simple green will break down the grease and coolant and you can wash it all away.

 

Thank you everyone for the replies, I agree tye leaking most likely mixed with greases dirt and other contaminants that were on the front of the engine, im waiting on my replacement water pump once installed ill clean and scrub the leaked coolant. My main concern was that some of the coolant had leaked onto my tensioner, ac pulley and alternator pulley, is there something I should do specifically for this? Or will using simple green and a little elbow grease be sufficient ?

 

Also will spraying the front of the engine be ok if I allow it to dry out ? Or I use the leaf blower to try and get most of it out, im worried anout water getting into alternatir amd other various electronics. Im thinking if I disconnect the battery and hose the engine down n then blow air through it and let it sit for 2 days or so in this california heat it'll be ok

 

Rambunctious, open up the garden hose on the alternator. You are not going to hurt that puppy. The only thing you really need to worry about is the top of the engine where the spark plugs are. You can let water run over that area, just don't use pressurized water in that area.

As for the pulleys and whatnot, do not worry about it. Worst case, pull out some 3in1 oil or some WD-40 and give the bearing a quick lube job. The oil will push out any water and all will be good in the end.

 

Sounds good thank you, ill provide and update on how it goes in a few days pump should arrive today and ill begin install mostlikey tomorrow.

 

+1 Simple Green will not hurt any of the components.

The paste-like stuff could be only coolant, but it would have to be leaking for bit of time. If it's only coolant, it may take a few tried to get it off. Warm up the engine for 10 minutes, then let it sit for 10 minutes. Then apply the SG, and let sit for 5. Rinse/repeat.

Get a can of "Dry Silicone" and use it after you're done, and the engine is dry. The silicone will dry to a "New Car" look, and dirt won't stick to it like Armor All type products. You will easily use a full can of it in one shot.

 

Goodmorning everyone, I decided to clean up the front of my engine with a dish sponge and just a little bit of dish soap and that alone did it. After I scrubbed it & hosed down the front of the motor and let it sit and dry for two days, no issues thus far.

thanks once again !

 

well done :-)

 

Thank you Sir,
The amount of debri that was collected in my catch tray was surprising, I used a large aluminium tray (the kind used for cooking) to catch all the water and it was completely black !!

 

Thanks for coming back with the result. Always good to know how things turn out.

Graham

 

No worries, just common courtesy