This is a water pump.

It’s not supposed to be in this many pieces. It’s supposed to be one piece.

It is, in fact, from a 1970 Triumph Stag – but fitted with a Rover v8 from an SD1. I’ve had this combination before, and it works very well – and one of the “what shall we check before we try to start the damn thing” checklist items should always be the water pump. Sometimes they’re fine, sometimes someone’s filled the cooling system with Radweld, and sometimes the cooling system’s been left open so there’s things living in it.

In this case, I haven’t the faintest idea what all the white gunk is that was throughout the coolant passages, but I’m betting the cause of whatever overheating event that occurred was the water pump being in many pieces.

The fact that none of it is even connected to the spindle probably means it didn’t move much water either!