How do you replace the water pump on a Dodge Dakota?

Answer 1

I have a 3.9L 2001. I just did this a month ago.Disconect hoses, there's still a lot of fluid in there even if you've had a bad leak.Removing the fan from the pully requires a special tool, but there's ways around that.I took the pump out with the fan attached. (The shaft in my pump bent so the belt was already off.) I think there were 8 bolts all around the front face of the pump.(bigger engins have 2 more than that)Removing the fan cowling (plastic shield) was a bit of a pain, in one spot that's hard to reach the manufacture switched to pop rivits (I didn't put it back in)With hoses disconected, bolts out, and cowling off you should be able to manuver the pump and fan out.To remove the fan, the dealers have a thin fork with 2 prongs that fit in the holes on the pully to keep it from turning while you undo the fan nut. I took a short scrap piece of metal staping, measured the distance between holes and placed bolts in the straping at that distance. You may have other options since I first tried to remove the fan while the pump was installed and made my tool at that point. With the fork in place you can loosen the nut holding the fan on.Install new pump without fan attached. Replace the belt. Not sure if you know about the tightner pully so here's the info anyways. Put a wrench on the nut of your tightening pully and pull towards the pump, its spring loaded and ment to move (the nut won't turn)Put the fan in place and tighten nut. The new water pump I got didn't have the same holes for that fork tool. Since I alread had the belt on, I tightened the bolt until I started turning the belt. The way its threaded and direction the belt turns makes it so it won't unthread.Replace fluid in rad & resevoirHave a beer!