[s-cars] power steering trouble

[Mike Fitton]

...otherwise known as: Help me not pay $360 for a seven-cent o-ring.

So my power steering system has been slowing leaking fluid for several 
months now.  It wasn't fast enough to worry about it until last 
weekend.  I was kind of afraid it was the rack, so I kind of did the 
head in the sand bit for a while.  Finally it started coming out fast 
enough to take a look.  Rack's fine.  It's coming out of that goofy plug 
on top of the pump.  You know, the one that looks like a giant 
phillips-head.  So I used my biggest flat-head and got it off relatively 
easily (the first time).  Found an o-ring underneath that has clearly 
failed.  But I didn't have a new o-ring for it and I'm fresh out of 
CHF-11S, so I stick it back on.  Then I remembered that there's a 
24-hour Advance not far from here, so I decided to take the o-ring with 
me over there to get a new one.

But now I can't get the plug out.  I didn't think I put it in that 
tight, but it isn't budging.  After about an hour of messing with it, 
the plug itself isn't looking too healthy.  I've used that screwdriver 
and a couple of other things.  Even ground down a chisel to a flat tip, 
but everything just skips out of the head.  I needed the car the next 
day, so I put some RTV around the edge hoping it would hold fluid.  The 
RTV held at first, but now it's leaking again and not slowly.  So I'm in 
desperate need of a new o-ring and preferably a new plug to stick in there.

So my first question: anyone have any clever ideas how to get that 
little guy out?

Second question: can I get just a new plug from somewhere?  There's a 
check valve under the plug that sits against it just so, so I can't just 
stick a random bolt in it.  ETKA doesn't appear to list a separate p/n 
for it, so officially the only way to get a new plug is with a new pump.

Third question: if I run out of p/s fluid for a few days before new 
fluid arrives in the mail, will it damage anything?  The pump isn't such 
a big deal, but I'll be damned if I'm going to let a bad o-ring on the 
front of the engine destroy the rack on the firewall.

Fourth question: why didn't I just look at it three months ago, like an 
intelligent and well-adjusted guy would have done?

-Cheers!
Mike