Recently bought a 98 EX. The guy that had it before me said he replaced the timing belt but not the water pump. Car has 77K miles on it. Trying to decide if I should replace the water pump now, or drive it for a few thousand miles. Do these water pumps go out slowly, or do they work great right up to failure? Everything seems fine right now.

 

My last car was an Oldsmobile 98 with about 80,000 miles on it and the water pump went out pretty quickly. One minute it was fine then the next it wasn't. But I know GM parts are made to break down and I'm not sure if you should worry about a Civic this early....