I guess I've reached that point in my cars life that once I fix one thing another things needs done, this time it didn't even wait for me to finish one task.
2006 2.4 238xxx
I noticed a puddle of coolant in the garage this morning when pulling out so I turned off the car and popped the hood, started to fill the coolant and the level was dropping at a slow steady rate with no bubbles coming out.. look under the car and there is a steady stream of coolant just pouring out from where it looks like the water pump is. I haven't taken the time to inspect further just yet.. could this just be a gasket has gone bad?

 

Water pump doesn't have a gasket it's a seal.
Time to get under the car and look.
Here is a video on how to change the water pump.

 

Took the slash guard off and started looking around, hard to tell where it was coming from so I topped it off, no leak, started car, it was leaking but I still can't make out where it's coming from. When topping off with the engine running I noticed ait bubbles but no dropping in coolant. I'm guessing blown head gasket and the pressure caused the water pump seal to go?
Edit: oil looks fine, no milkyness

 

Could be the bearing in the pump wore out, it acts as a seal. The weep hole is at the top of the pump; I don't know why.
Could be the O-ring failed.
Could be a loose bolt.
Could be a loose drain plug.
If it is streaming it should be easy to find.

 

messy, but easy...

 

Go in from the top with a wand mirror, you don’t want Decool on your clothes or in your eyes.

 

So the coolant was pouring out of the weep hole. Looks like that's where my disappearing coolant was going by looking at the water marks on the pump until it gave out completely. Replaced it using the info from this forum. It's makes a whine noise now, normal?

 

When I had a new one whine I took it back for a replacement.

 

I read that when lining up the holes I could spin the water pump by the fins but when I tried I couldn't get it to budge. I couldn't really reach my arm up there very well so it was just fingertip strength I was trying to use. I just took it back down and oriented it with how the outside looked and it worked out okay.. but how much resistance would the pump have? I also read that the timing tensioner could be the cause?

 

In my case it was a defective unit.