Yesterday was the perfect day to change the P.S fluid (which looked brown mollases based?). Did not take long ,but I did manage to make a bit of a mess, since the plug came out of the reservoir return spout & dumped it all over the floor. Finally I found a plastic plug which was a perfect fit, this cured that problem. I then found some suitable fittings to connect into the return line with 3ft of tube into a drain bucket, filled up the reservoir & instructed my son to start the engine. I was really surprised how quickly the reservoir was empty ; about 3 seconds flat!!! I ran about 2 quarts of Mercon through the system & the stuff was coming out the same colour as when it went in (the nice red stuff). Sooooo total job cost me about $9, a far cry from the $35-50 shop price.
The old oil was not as bad as I thought, but there was some brown goop with some rusty looking filings or dirt in it.

It's nice pink stuff now & got a good feeling that it's one less thing which should be able to go wrong!

Next job will be the Transmission oil, I've scoped out some quick connect fittings at work to make the job easy for next time. That job is $80 for just oil replacement at the shop, so money saves up quick if you sort out these simple maintenace problems, well worth the extra effort IMHO.

All the best Aeroman.

 

Be sure to do the coke can cover over the cap. It really keeps the water out of the system and is free.

ken

 

Yeah ,saw that post a few days back, funny thing is I've never seen a drip of water on my reservoir/ dip stick cap ! & no water in the oil either.
However , I cant see any harm in it, & it does make a good umbrella AND also looks like it would keep the dust/crud from building around the filler neck!

 

any water in the pwr steering system is a killer on the pump gears and bearings plus pitts and corrodes the rack bore