The Perils Of Procrastination

Well, work on the Ford has ground to a halt. I had hoped to have the power steering working this week but no such luck. I've owned this car for about 12 years and the power steering has been broken that whole time. I've been gathering parts for it but never got around to putting them in until now.

The original power steering pump was bad when I bought the car. It had burned up after one of the hoses went bad and caused all of the fluid to leak out. So I bought a new pump and hoses 11 years ago and put them on a shelf in my garage. Then we moved and I put them on a shelf in my new garage.

The problem with waiting all this time is that other things have had time to go bad. Replacing the pump and hoses when I bought them probably would have prevented this from happening. Now I just have to live with the consequences of procrastination.

I finally put in the pump and hoses on Tuesday. Jason came out to help me by starting up the car and turning the steering wheel back and forth so I could bleed the system. He's 12 so getting to sit behind the wheel and start the car was a pretty big deal for him. And it was nice to have him involved.

But I knew something was wrong almost immediately. The fluid was coming out foamy as if it were sucking in lots and lots of air from somewhere. So I had him stop turning the wheel while I climbed under the car to have a look and sure enough the control valve was pissing fluid everywhere. The control valve is the part that directs the fluid from the pump to where it needs to be. If you're trying to turn left, the control valve sends the fluid to the part of the system that helps you turn left. There are hoses on the control valve as well that can, and in this case, have gone bad.

These are all parts that were easily obtained from any auto parts store 12 years ago. Now, not so much. I was able to get a rebuild kit from a place called Dearborn Classics, the one stop shop for old Ford stuff. But that means waiting at least a week for the control valve rebuild kit and another 3 weeks for the hoses because they were out of stock.

All I want is for my car to work right. Is that so wrong?

Done for now.
rob