as for the water pump, on my 98 ls i found the water pump to have a bad bearing. it did not turn as freely as the new one.

i am goin to share one little secret that nobody has talked about on this board about the timing. if you take white out and make marks on both cams and the crank timing gear while the old belt is on, making sure you make the mark is on any tooth and on the belt, it helps out alot. what you can do is, once you remove the old belt, count the number of teeth between marks and make the same marks on the new belt. then just place the new belt on with aligning the new belt to the marks on the pulleys and the belt correctly and the timing should be set. it beats having to fight with the belt if you don't place it on right and if you have trouble with finding the timing marks.