Any specific big reasons that will matter for the next ~40k miles? I'm starting my second semester of college and money is tight.

 

I suggested the brass impeller as brass has better corrosion resistance. The standard iron impeller version will work as well. Most water pumps fails due to the bearings and not the impeller. You should be okay if money is tight.

 

Awesome, I'll stick with iron till I'm out of school then. Thanks!

 

For future readers of this thread, the '03 Vin "death range" had nothing to do with the OP's issue and tends to still be drug up from the depths when owners panic.

For the record the issue involved misplaced dowel pins holding the front cover to the block. This led to lateral stress being put on the oil pump gears which caused them to break prematurely leading to low oil pressure which leads to a loud ticking. Most actual issues of the front cover being misaligned have been resolved long ago. The factory remedy was to completely replace the block. I got a new block this way at 38k. No truck with a compromised oil pump will still be on the road with 130k on the clock.

Not every loud ticking is a broken oil pump.

Oil pumps break on all years, not just the '03.

Low oil pressure happens for other reasons.

Ticking happens for other reasons.

High temps happen for other reasons besides low oil pressure... Like the cooling system... which is more known to fail when not maintained than the oil pump.

 

Thanks for clearing all that up for other readers, though I should note that I haven't had any problems with high temps.

 

so it was another victim of '03 vin number death range. good to know.










i'm joking. glad you sorted it out.