Barmaley

Hello everybody,

I need your help to figure out what is the right next step in my attempt to fix power steering. Yesterday my son too Impala TL 2007 to a local shop for state inspection, planning to make several stops on the way. He called me and said that power steering quit working and he will get extra fluid to fill in. It did not help and he anyway get to inspection shop. They failed inspection because of valve cover was leaking on exhaust anyway; they also suggested that power steering pump is bad. I called a street mechanic today today to fix valve gaskets and the power steering pump. He told me that I remember your car and I changed power steering pump on it 6 month ago. Nevertheless we did the gaskets and changed the pump since it was on the way anyway; the problem persists. However, if before we changed the pump it was not giving groaning noise, now it does. We called for the day and he suggested that I need to replace the rack. When I returned a belt which I don't need to replace since we did it 6 month ago when I changed the pump first time, a clerk at the store suggested that I may need to do vacuum bleed of power steering fluid, since without it the pump will not work. Last time we changed the pump we did not bleed it and it was working fine for 10,000 miles since that. I do not want to change the rack if the problem is in something else. How can I diagnose the problem before changing expensive part?

Barmaley

I spoke to another mechanic and he told me that the problem could be in the air if the pump. Advance Autoparts offer a special pump for proper powersteering pump installation, the also told me that if I would not take air out of pump before first use I may ruin the pump. Any knowledge about it?