About two weeks ago my power steering stopped working without warning. Everything seemed fine, no noises, belt and PS pulley were fine, just no indication of what made it go out.

Went for a drive today, and the power steering magically started working again. What can cause the power steering to work and not work whenever it wants? I figured if it was the pump or rack that once it died, it stayed dead!

 

The very thing about any cars,you know there is a problem and just like going to the dr.It fixs it self. Try doing a p/s fluid flush.I think the pump maybe start to go out.But that is just a guess.

 

OK, how do I do a power steering flush on the 98 T&C? The reservoir does not have a return line. It only has one hose coming from it.

I removed the reservoir and cleaned it. I inserted my little suction pump in the hose and sucked out as much fluid as I could, maybe a little over 12oz. Put the reservoir back on, but it did not seem to take near as much fluid as I sucked out. In fact, it seemed that it took as much as would have been needed to fill the reservoir, but not the hose.

Either way, at best, this did little more than to dilute some very old and dirty power steering fluid.

In this setup, I don't even really understand the purpose of the reservoir. If the fluid does not circulate through the reservoir, it's little more than a holder to feed fluid in case of a leak.

Anyhow, got a driveway procedure for flushing the fluid?

 

What i do, is have 2 qts of atf and with engine running, i'll suck out the old and fill with the new. Until the fluid is no longer brown.And move the steering lock to lock.

 

I'm still missing something here. If there is no return to the reservoir, what good are does this procedure actually do? You'd only be replacing the fluid north of the pump, so to speak. It's a fill hose from the reservoir.

As I said, I removed every bit of fluid that I could get to from the top and replaced it. When I run the vehicle there is no movement of the ps fluid in the reservoir at all. I drove it, got it hot, and the fluid didn't combine with the rest of the fluid in the system, as it still was clear and undisturbed.

How does this method exchange any fluid in the pump or the rack?

 

Then there maybe a problem with the pump.

 

I also agree that I most likely have a problem with the pump, but I still need to understand how the power steering works in this van.

Can somebody please answer my question from my last post please? I'm not trying to be rude, just trying to learn something.

 

get yourself a high school automotive text book and you can learn exactly how power steering works.

 

My guess is that the reservoir works as an expansion tank for the system. Fluid goes in and out of it based on thermal expansion much like the overflow tank does for the radiator.
Based on that, you would need to drive for some time and then repeat the process until you get nearly full dilution.