Opening In Water Pump

I'm doing a radiator replacement and investigating the water pump in the process. It feels solid and no wobble. I didn't previously notice issues other than the leak in the radiator.

But the pump has this opening in the bottom. I cannot find this angle online to compare, and it looks almost hand done. Is this typical? Something that should be corrected?

Thanks for taking a look!

 

That is normal. It is called a "weep hole".

 

Some water pumps have a weep hole on the bottom. This is a tell-tale that the bearing is starting to fail, and the internal seal is worn.
Yours appears to be dry so the pump is probably OK.
However, I'm with you. If you have everything apart and drained, replace everything, especially if you don't know how long those components have been in service.

 

Thank you! Larger than I expected to see. Appreciate the reassurance.

 

Thank you for taking a look! I'm trying not to do more than necessary, but as far as I know, the pump is original, and I'd hate to take all this apart again.

 

OTH, in my book the newest parts are the greater unknown, and always the most suspect.

 

The water pump on these engines is easy to get to, and that weep hole will give some advance notice of a pending failure. If it isn't leaking I would not replace it just because I didn't know how old it was.

 

PeteL has a good point...I'm not as familiar with the I4 engines as I am the newer models. I've had my share of new parts fail prematurely also.

 

This used to be my opinion, but with the quality of replacement parts these days, i don't know.

 

I just replaced the water pump on mine. It's a pretty straightforward task. The thing that took the longest was stripping and spray painting the new one when it arrived. otherwise its just a matter of scraping a gasket and hooking some hoses up.

If it's working though, just roll with it. keep an eye on the weep hole every now and again to make sure its not leaking.

 

That’s why they give such a long warranty now days, they know they are not going to last….