My Ram is a 2002. I bought it used and haven't had any problems what-so-ever with it. I think that's a pretty good streak for a 4 year old vehicle. But today I noticed a small problem, which may or may not turn into a big problem.

Winter is finally here in Ohio and the temperature this morning was about 25 degrees. I didn't have time to let the truck warm up before leaving for work, and as I pulled out of the driveway, to make a right turn, the steering kinda stopped for a brief moment. It's hard to explain. I turned the wheel a couple inches, then the steering wheel tightened, then loosened up, and then tightened again. It finally went back to normal. All this happened in the matter of about 4 seconds.

When starting to pull out of my job's parking lot, I could feel the steering kinda sticking and moving in a chunky fashion, not fluent.

After the truck ran for a minute, it was perfectly fine.

If you've got an idea for what's wrong, or any suggestions, please help me out.

John

 

Is it a 4x4 and was in on?

 

Nope, it's 2 wheel drive.

 

Sounds to me that your engine idle was low and the engine was about to quit and it caught itself. Power stering starts to go out at low RPMs. Just my guess.

Danelizer

 

That's a great point. I didn't even think to look at the RPM's. I will tomorrow morning though.

Would that low idle be normal for an ice cold truck put into drive?

I have had car's that experienced the low idle problem, but I never noticed a problem with the steering like this.

 

How many miles and when was the last time it was serviced? How is the fluid level? How is the belt?

 

It has about 36,000 miles, had a tune up at 30,000, at which time the mechanic noticed a slow leak of the power steering fluid as a result of a missing clamp. Obviously he put the clamp on. As far as the belt, I haven't even checked it.

 

Here is where I would look. Actually it sounds like a case of belt slippage but I would -
1. Check the ps fluid
2. Check the belt tension
3. If all that checks out, see if your slow leak is hitting the belt.
4. Get a can of belt dressing.
5. get a buddy to crank it up and while it's cold, have him turn the steering wheel to see what happens.

It could have just been the fluid was too thick from the cold to circulate through the pump. You might want to change fluids to something more winter proof.

 

The PS fluid is nothing more than ATF. I don't think that it would be so thick that it wouldn't work.

Did you go over any puddles or is there any reason the belt would have been wet, I think someone mentioned PS fluid on the belt from leakage.

Has it happened since you started the thread?

Personally, I do not like belt dressing. I think it just temporarily covers up something else such as worn pulleys, pulleys out of alignment, stretched belt, etc. That being said, I have used it in tractor and other applications with great success.

So for starters, check for leaks, check the fluid level, check the belt tension. You can also unhook the line going from the resevoir and drain the old stuff out and put new stuff in to do a fluid change to see if that helps, however, it is more preventative maintenance than curative.

Lastly, hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving yesterday and keep us informed as to what you find out.

 

Its starting to get winter here in Oklahoma as well. Mine did the exact same thing this morning. My guess is that something had started to gel up in the pump. After it ran a few seconds everything was the way it should be.