'97 Taurus GL Wagon: Power Steering Pump Screech

'97 Taurus GL Wagon: Power Steering Pump Screech

Blew a hole in my coolant bypass hose near the water pump and replaced it with an "old" one from the parts I kept off the "donor" car from the panel replacement project a few months ago. At the same time, and I don't see how the two could be related, the Power Steering Pump has started screeching loudly. I'm assuming it's the P/S pump making the noise because whenever I spray water mist on the face of the P/S pump pulley, the noise goes completely away.

Questions:

1.) Turns out I also have a "donor" P/S pump. How do I know if this pump is any good? About all I can do is turn the shaft and pull in and out on it. Seems to be pretty tight. Also, this "donor" has been sitting around in a dry bucket with it's connection points uncovered. This wouldn't be a problem, would it?

2.) How do I get the pulley off and on? The shop manual shows "special tools", as does the Haynes manual. Can I use a 3-jaw puller to get it off and some makeshift "tool" to press it back on? Or does Harbor Freight sell these tools?

3.) Can I drive it like this until the weekend (4 days, 25 miles back and forth to work)? It's dicey, right? If it seizes up, I'm in big trouble. Four day weekend and this thing has to fail on the last day!!!

Call off the search.

It appears it's coolant on the belt.

But is the belt history because of this, or can I "wash" it off with repeated misting?

The belt is only 2.5 years (and 35,000 miles) old. The factory belt lasted 150,000 miles. Can such a small amount of coolant destroy a serp belt.

Correct, coolant on the belt can cause belt noise. You will probably be able continue to mist the belt and pulleys to wash them off. Since you used an old bypass hose you may be repeating all this work soon anyway so no point in replacing the belt right now if it is in decent shape. If you do opt to replace the belt, be sure to clean the pulley's of coolant residue before installing the new belt.

-Rod

Can't believe very much coolant got on the belt. The hose blew a hole out it's backside creating a stream toward the firewall. The belt and pulleys are really forward of this point. Plus, it happened all of 60 seconds from my driveway.

I'm going to continue "washing it" to see if I can make the screeching go away. Someone on another site suggested soapy water while another suggested spraying brake parts cleaner. That'll be plan B and plan C, I guess.

The "donor" hose came off a Taurus that was one-year younger with about 30,000 less miles on it. I'm guessing it'll last at least 2-3 years. My theory is the original hose finally sprung the leak where it did because I've had to pull it off 2 to 3 times every winter for the last 5 years to flush out the heater core (because it plugs up). I pull the hose off at the top of the firewall on the short 6" section from the molded "T", but this ends up exerting some backward pressure on the hose "elbow" at the water pump connection - exactly where the pinhole leak occurred...