It was on my 2004 WRX. I had a whole bunch of stuff I just ignored since I didn't think I had time to get them fixed. One was my A/C belt was whining but I just ignored it and then the A/C wouldn't work. I had a quick look and then realized that the belt had completely come off, the idler pulley was chewed up (probably because the bearing was completely shot), and it had been spinning well off the drive pulley grooves and cut into the timing belt cover. Yeah - I should have had it looked at a long time ago.
However, I was also having problems with my power steering whining and being weak - especially at a cold idle. It would get better as the car warmed up (or I revved it up), but I thought it was also belt related. There's a certain turn near home where I'd actually try to slow down and rev up the engine so I didn't have to fight the steering wheel. I mentioned it to a mechanic who does work at home cheap. He works on a lot of Subarus for his day job and said it was likely the PS pressure hose hardening over time, and that the lack of flexibility meant it would suck air into the system. I went home to research it after I'd already dropped off the car, and many cite a simple O-ring fix, where the O-ring is compromised and under pressure it'll suck in air through the weak O-ring but won't leak fluid because there's backpressure when the engine is shut off.
In any case, it was time for a timing belt change, so I had him fix the A/C belt and pulley, replace the timing belt (he also covered over the hole in the cover), and replaced the P/S hose. In the end it cost me $550 altogether including parts, which was a pretty good deal since I think at a shop it might have cost $1200 (mostly labor).
So it did occur to me that once I tried using the turkey baster (plus vinyl hose) to try and suck out as much PSF and then topped off with Subaru ATF-HP (what Subaru recommends now instead of Dexron-III). I was thinking it didn't really hurt the mechanical components, but that maybe it might have resulted in an O-ring failure. I was thinking maybe "false seals" or that a different type of fluid may have hardened an already marginal system.
So now I have Arctic blast A/C again (and it was getting ridiculous since my car sits outside in the sun, the PS no longer whines, and I'm not too worried about my timing belt now. However, I'm wondering if the replacement of the PS hose was necessary. It didn't really cost me that much ($30 in parts and the labor was probably the same).
However, I was also having problems with my power steering whining and being weak - especially at a cold idle. It would get better as the car warmed up (or I revved it up), but I thought it was also belt related. There's a certain turn near home where I'd actually try to slow down and rev up the engine so I didn't have to fight the steering wheel. I mentioned it to a mechanic who does work at home cheap. He works on a lot of Subarus for his day job and said it was likely the PS pressure hose hardening over time, and that the lack of flexibility meant it would suck air into the system. I went home to research it after I'd already dropped off the car, and many cite a simple O-ring fix, where the O-ring is compromised and under pressure it'll suck in air through the weak O-ring but won't leak fluid because there's backpressure when the engine is shut off.
In any case, it was time for a timing belt change, so I had him fix the A/C belt and pulley, replace the timing belt (he also covered over the hole in the cover), and replaced the P/S hose. In the end it cost me $550 altogether including parts, which was a pretty good deal since I think at a shop it might have cost $1200 (mostly labor).
So it did occur to me that once I tried using the turkey baster (plus vinyl hose) to try and suck out as much PSF and then topped off with Subaru ATF-HP (what Subaru recommends now instead of Dexron-III). I was thinking it didn't really hurt the mechanical components, but that maybe it might have resulted in an O-ring failure. I was thinking maybe "false seals" or that a different type of fluid may have hardened an already marginal system.
So now I have Arctic blast A/C again (and it was getting ridiculous since my car sits outside in the sun, the PS no longer whines, and I'm not too worried about my timing belt now. However, I'm wondering if the replacement of the PS hose was necessary. It didn't really cost me that much ($30 in parts and the labor was probably the same).
