I'm really not sure what state the pump is mate, it looks quite new but not checked it by taking it off, the problem is I've got another engine that I've been building in the garage that will be going in as soon as the weather changes, I've basically just put her back on the road so I could take get down to ford fair but I stick no chance with the temp prob, after work I will make sure they are touching, did you flush your system with just a hose pipe via header pipe or just flush rar then, take stat out and flush block etc?? Cheers pal