is it worth changing the water pump??

[Hot_Wheels]

ok i have a 88 festiva i plan on doing a b6t swap in soon. my dilemma is i cant afford to do the swap probably for another month and i need daily transportation. the festiva i have was shipped in from cali it has 224,xxx on the clock it burns a little oil on start up and it can sometimes be hard to start. now this may sound weird but the previous owner said he put 2 stroke plugs in it because the oil keept fowling plugs. i havent checked the plugs to see if he was blowing smoke up my ass but he didnt seem like it, he gave me the model and year of a atv or something they came on. well anyways my goal is to get the car to be somewhat drivable. the car has a over heating problem the original radiator was cracked so i modified my festiva and put a aspire radiator in. but now it seems to build alot of pressure it shoots the over flow cap off and the radiator cap will blow too when it gets too hot. when i add water it seems like a little drips out from the passenger side by the accessories im guessing water pump but im still confused if the pump is leaking why is it building so much pressure?? bad thermostat? bad head gasket??? i dont have a leak down tester but i have a regular one i think i heard a trick put a little oil in the cylinders and see if it increases the compression but that would only tell me if it was the rings and not a warped head or bad gasket. no oil coolant mix yet.. any ideas?? would it be just cheaper and easier to put my b6t in?

thanks
rick

[aithanmier]

just do the swap..if your planning on doing it anyway there is no point throwing money into a trashed engine. just my .02

[Festy46]

is it worth changing the water pump??

H.W. Check your messages. I wouldn't want to clutter this group with some useless drivel from a "Lurker".

[Wildknife]

I just had to replace my waterpump in my 93 festy. its pretty cheep (30 for a new one) the messed up part is that you have to remove your air intake to get to the waterpump (and yes, that leak where you said it was, is the waterpump) after removing the air intake and the debree cover, you'll have to (oh god) remove the timing belt...

I got mine in, but I have a new problem. MY FESTY STILL OVERHEATS!!!
so I dunno what you should do.. (gas prices now adays..mm..festy what?)

[Tim]

Water pump was the first thing I replaced on my Festiva.


Regards,

Tim