I have a 1999 Buick Le Sabre (98000 miles) that had a hydrostatic lock when the UIM blew thru by the EGR weakened area, after my wife parked it at a shopping mall recently. My mechanic (who I think is great) replaced the UIM with the Dorman kit and put in new plugs and PCV valve. He did not go down further and replace the LIM gaskets. He said he usually doesn't go down to the LIM gaskets unless we were losing coolant before. My question is do the factory LIM gaskets ever go for 200,000+ miles. I hope to drive this car another 100,000 miles and I am wondering if I should have insisted on him doing the LIM gaskets.

If you didn't get it done yet it would have been a good idea to do the lowers also because they tend to be problematic on the 3800. Are you the first owner? If you weren't loosing coolant before hand it is probably still good but will probably need to be change before 200k if it has not been yet. 99 I think they had the LIM problem under control.

Mine wasn't leaking coolant. I did a top swap with a ported LIM and this is what I had.



They should have been changed.

We were going out of town the next day on the 4th and he said it probaly would not need it and he didn't know if he could have it done the next day if he went that far down.

It only take like a extra hour or so to pull the LIM. To change them later you will need to change the UIM gaskets again. Watch your oil, coolant and the inside of the oil filler cap.