ocpanther

Help !! I have an 89 300E which I have been trying to rehab back to some of its former glory. I am a newbie here but have been reading all the posts for the last several months. I am a decent backyard mechanic, but am much more familiar with American or Japanese cars.

Here is the problem, I was at a local junk yard (SoCal) finding goodies I know I need to replace and grabbed a working windshield wiper reservoir pump. I was about to install my excellent find when I opened the reservoir to see it full of hot green fluid. Now let me tell you I just replaced my leaking radiator about two weeks ago, but didn’t notice then that it appears the coolant is in the washer fluid.

Is this common? Do the heating elements usually leak? Does anyone have a good suggestion on how to bypass the two heater lines or repair the heater tube? Any and all suggestions welcome as I want to get this newest quirk fixed ASAP as I don’t want to harm my new radiator.

i6h000

Mine wasn't leaking but living in SoCal myself didn't see the need for heated washer fluid, besides the tank just acts as a heatsink anyways. I just bypassed mine. Many diff ways to do it, I just happened to have a piece of 5/16" stainless tubing which I bent into a U shape and slightly flared the ends and installed with two hose clamps. Good luck.
Mike

ocpanther

Thanks for the bypass advise. I went and got an adapter to bypass the two lines around the windshield washer tank. (Looking for one is it's own story)

I drained the washer tank and confirmed it was full of coolant. This creates quite a mess by the way. I pulled the two pumps out of the tank and flushed the whole thing out a couple of times. Amazing how this started by just wanting to swap the wiper pump because it wasn't working.

So after much swearing and several cut hose clamps i got the tank back in with the new pumps installed. One more of the projects on thie never ending list complete.

I am going to try to create a refurb story as I replace things as almost everything needs to be worked on except the engine and trans.

Next is the heater bypass pump. Anyone ever try to rebuild one that was leaking?

ocpanther

Has anyone rebuilt the aux pump when it is leaking? I got a spare at the junk yard and want to rebuild it. My local indy told me there used to be a kit for them, but it got discontinued because so many people did it wrong. It can't be that hard as it just comes apart so any help or advice would be great.

frannie