Update - Loud power steering pump Olds.

[GreeCguy]

95 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera, 144,000 miles. Last week while checking front end of vehicle, I jacked up the car and when I let it off the jack, the power steering pump started making a loud whiney noise like a spoiled girl left home on prom night. Plenty of fluid and couldn't figure out why it suddenly grew loud.

Drove car to Orlando, 80 miles. Pumped old fluid out, replaced with Max Life power steering fluid. As soon as I started car, it was quiet like it used to be. Drove home and ran quiet all the way home.

What confuses me is that I flushed the system about six weeks ago. Pumped old fluid out, replaced with DexIII/M, flushed and replaced fluid several times in one day and assumed that the fluid I flushed out this week would be nice and clean. Instead, it was just as dirty as the original fluid I pulled six weeks ago. Do you suppose this fluid cleaned the system and that was part of the noise problem? It did not smell burnt, was just very dirty.

 

[MolaKule]

Quote:
What confuses me is that I flushed the system about six weeks ago. Pumped old fluid out, replaced with DexIII/M, flushed and replaced fluid several times in one day and assumed that the fluid I flushed out this week would be nice and clean. Instead, it was just as dirty as the original fluid I pulled six weeks ago.


Not unusual. I had to do about 4 drain and refills on my daughter's TrailBlazer PS system before the fluid finally became clean and stayed that way.

Another problem might have been air in the system. With the reservoir cap off and the front end jacked up, I run the engine and go from one (soft) stop to the other a few times slowly to purge air from the system.