Major Water Leak 98 Blazer
 

Antifreeze leaking from underneath front caused me to suspect water pump. Let the car sit for a couple of weeks and was about to replace water pump and found steam coming from behind compressor bracket. Put water in while running and noticed water running straight up from behind comp bracket. Water flows out of this area when filling radiator without engine running. Any ideas?

intake manifold gasket-jerry

I just came in from looking at my sons 96 . Has leak in exact same place .I am going to take off compressor bracket to see exactly where it is . how much of a job is the intake manifold gasket. I am mechanically inclined . I have just never taken off major components of the engine. approximate hours and is there a good post showing this job. Thanks

http://www.handymanlyness.com/archiv..._99_Jimmy.html

http://helpwrench.com/forums/showthr...ctions-and-pic

And WELCOME to the forum.

Thank You Verno , the first link is not only my engine but the leak is exactly where mine is . so far the only difference in some of the procedures I've seen is they say you dont have to remove the compressor bracket I have loosened it and moved it forward but not far enough to access the bolt you have to get to . I think I will have to remove it which requires me to remove the Power steering pulley. thanks also for the welcome

I just did this job. A few critical notes:

* Only need to remove and replace the LIM gasket

*Have blue painters tape and mark every connector you pull, suggest things like driver side exhaust manifold connector as label descriptions, without this they become cloudy in where they went, you will be tired and not want to fight this

* You will have to pull the wiring harness from main fuse box, both descriptions fail to mention this- fairly easy to do

* but an extra tube of black RTV, the gasket kits come with just enough, and unless you are an expert- just enough will not be enough

* have a friend help you when placing the LIM back in place. I had to do it twice as I spread the RTV when I placed it the first time. Do not use pens as guides as they can and will snap possibly sending large pieces of pen into the engine, or getting stuck in the threads causing you to remove the IM to retrieve.

If you are not a torque expert, I recommend the Victor Reinz LM gasket over the Fel-Pro. The VR gasket is designed to forgive over torque much better than the Fel-Pro.

Thanks to Verno
 

Thank you for the great pictures you made available to me through the links you provided. My 98 is leaking from the front drivers side corner of the manifold as one example noted> I will not be able to tackle this job till it gets warmer and or stops accumulating snow where I live. I looked everything over quickly and my only question for now is is it necessary to remove the upper IM before removing the lower or can they both be removed as a unit? Thanks again!

I'm an old flatulator and did mine last fall. One thing I noticed on the guide you were given is that the torque is incorrectly listed at 35ft lbs. It should be around 132 inch lbs. Pens don't work but a couple of metal pins or headless screws help a lot....one in each corner is all you need. Two sets of hands make the reinstall a lot easier...in my case it was Grandma.

I picked up a little box of round paper tags with string to mark all the connections. The hardest part for me was getting out the distributor...the rest was easy but time consuming. Cleaning off the manifold and mount are very important because they don't get torqued down very tightly. There's one hidden bolt on the Power Steering mount but one of the guides shows it clearly. I had to take a prybar to the AC/PS mount to get to the front LIM bolt. When all done do or get a pressure test done on the cooling system...just gives you a little piece of mind that the job was done right.