Had a go at machining the mating surface of the water pump impeller. Actually the plan was to go over to a friend to ask him if it could be done on his lathe and when he would have time to do it. Five minutes later it was ready;
Will polish the surface with some very fine (1600) emery paper before putting it all together with a recondition kit.
Also found out during the water pumps renovation that a ball joint separator tool is perfect for removing impeller remains from the pump shaft!
Under the pretention of resupplying the spare parts a bit I had a go at reconditioning the water pump I took out of ‘t Kreng in September. To start with I tried to remove the impeller from the shaft. After some not to heavy taps on the top of the shaft with a hammer I could see that the shaft had moved a bit … I had progress. So I continued with the tapping. Until the impeller suddenly fell apart in 5 pieces. Damn, I hate jig saws!
Looking at the surfaces of the cracks I can only conclude that the quality of the casting isn't that great. It looks rather brittle with quite a lot of crystals in it. And yes it was an aftermarket item, not an original Unipart one.
So while I was working on Renés Dolomite today I rummaged through his parts attic and found a pump with a fairly good impeller and a completely knackered shaft (missing a few teeth). Ideal, as the shaft of the pump I wanted to recondition is in pretty good shape. And this impeller came off without a problem.
As you can see it looks a bit rusty but that’s only very light surface rust. Only thing that needs to be done is machining the mating surface for the seal lightly to get it smooth again.
