I'm 90 miles from home and the water pump went out in my '96 Mark VIII. I've got everything ready to replace it, but I can't get the old pump to come off!

I've sprayed it down with PB blaster and am waiting to see if that will free anything up.

Any ideas on how to pop this thing loose?

Smack it gently with a dead blow.

I've been tapping it from every direction I can get to it from with no success.

There doesn't seem to be anyplace to get hold of it to pull. Think a gear puller might do something?

Mine seemed to be stuck in pretty good after 173,000 miles but I kept pulling hard while rocking it up and down and finally it broke loose. I had more of a problem getting the new one to to go back in with the seal greased up. I finally had to get it lined up straight as possible and then start putting the bolts in equally all around and it went right into place. It tightened up flush with a good seal and no leaks yet for over two weeks.

Be very sure you removed the correct bolt on the bottom of the water pump.

There are two down there, right next to each other. The one on the right side of the car (your left) is for the timing chain cover. The one on the left side of the car (your right) is the bolt for the bottom of the water pump.

I had the same problem. I *thought* I had removed all four bolts. Instead, I removed three bolts for the water pump, and one bolt from the timing chain cover. I couldn't get the pump to budge.

Once I discovered that I had taken off the wrong bolt from underneath the water pump and removed the correct bolt, the pump came off with no problem.

a big fat rubber mallet... it took me 1 swift shot and VOILA !!!

It took a couple massive blows with a 12lb sledge hammer to get the water pump to come loose on my Crown Vic (I was either going to get it loose or pull it out piece by piece,) but the one on the VIII was easy.

i grabbed a short pole and a sledge when doing my water pump in my t-bird. had a friend hold the pipe on the snout of the pump and i went to town. that thing was on there good, took me about 10 mins

Well I got the GD thing loose after soaking it with PB Blaster and tapping it with a hammer until it started to move. Removing the alternator was a BIG help and allowed me to gently pry it out from the top.

Anyone doing this should definitly get the alternator out of the way.

The new pump went right in and everything has been cool since!

The water pumps I had to pull out never caused any problems...