I am sure this has been posted a thousand times, but here we go. My van makes that infamous whining that all dodge van owners talk about. I comes on after the van is well warmed up and driven for 20 miles or so and continues even at a full stop. I do notice it coming from driver side. Any links to posts or a solution would be helpful. thinking of flushing the tranny, but having a hard time coughing up the $80.

 

It might just be your power steering reservoir. The PS reservoir includes a permanent fine mesh screen towards its bottom that gets clogged up over time. Once that happens, then the PS pump is starved of fluid and whines all the time or intermittently.

If this is the case, you can just replace the reservoir with a new one. You can check online for new ones. Mine was around $24 I think. While you have the hoses disconnected, take advantage of the opportunity to purge your old PS fluid. It needs ATF-4, as specified by Chrysler.

 

I replaced the resevoir the first time but I cleaned it the second time with carb cleaner.

 

Just wondering if anyone has punched holes through the filter and pressed on. That filter has created more problems then they're worth. 3rd gen vans don't have a filter and you rarely hear about PS noises or any other PS problems.

 

I have read about other people doing exactly that in my online research. I just wasn't able to find conclusive evidence as to whether or not puncturing the screen might endanger the pump if contaminants were to enter the system. At least one or two people suspected that it might just be a CYA engineering measure, but as I am not a professional mechanic I didn't want to find out the hard way...