[s-cars] Power steering pump resistance?

[Tom Green]

I don't recognize your difficulty in rotating the pump as anything I  
have encountered
with the pump, Aaron.  My experience is it is difficult to keep the  
pulley from turning.
Perhaps if you remove one of the hose connections or loosen it to see  
if it could be
caused by blockage in the line.  I am thinking that some debris may  
have caught in
the orifice or screens in the banjo fittings.

Do you see significant movement in the tensioner and serpentine belt  
or does it
operate smoothly?  Has the spring in the tensioner failed as well as  
the bearing?
I assume the belt is wearing excessively as well?  Have you rebuilt  
the tensioner with
new bearings?

It is a piston pump, Randy, but a somewhat sophisticated design with  
a high flow but
variable output for the steering and less flow but high pressure for  
the brake booster.

Tom

> D0ate: Wed, 28 May 2008 12:22:58 -0700
> From: "McCall, Randy" <rmccall at nexant.com>
> Subject: Re: [s-cars] Power steering pump resistance?
> To: <s-car-list at audifans.com>
> Message-ID:
> 	<99A2815FF4D295488E034407278B16A401E294C7 at sacexm01.nexant.corp>
> Content-Type: text/plain;	charset="us-ascii"
>
> Aaron,
>
> I wasn't aware that serpentine belts used retired people on  
> pensions for
> bearings - I can certainly see why they would wear out as old as they
> must be; but I'll assume that's just an amusing typo ;-)
>
> After just finishing up a t-belt R&R this past weekend due to a failed
> water pump, I can tell you that the PS pump on my 95.5 S6 turns with
> relatively light resistance - I believe its a piston pump, so perhaps
> one of the valves controlling pentosin flow is not functioning  
> correctly
> in your pump (although pentosin is not a compressible fluid, so I'm  
> not
> completely sure about how pressure is acheived - spring loaded
> checkvalves?). In any case even with the pulley removed, the pump  
> flange
> was relatively easy to move through a rotation, and I can't recall any
> portion of the rotation cycle that was high resistance (clear
> compression areas in the pulley rotation cycel are there, but not at
> high resistance).
>
> -Randy
> 95.5 S6A
>
> Date: Wed, 28 May 2008 08:20:46 -0700 (PDT)
> From: Aaron Ryba <aaronryba at yahoo.com>
> Subject: [s-cars] Power steering pump resistance?
> To: s-car-list <s-car-list at audifans.com>
> Message-ID: <207244.24888.qm at web51410.mail.re2.yahoo.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
>
> O-holy S-list,
>
> I am trying to troubleshoot why I am prematurely wearing down serp  
> belt
> pensioners/bearings.
>
> Can anyone tell me what kind of resistance if any should be  
> expected on
> rotating a power steering pump by hand (all hooked up with fluid, belt
> off, etc.)?
>
> I am getting some significant resistance for about 60 degrees of
> rotation.
>
> TIA
> Aaron Ryba
> 95 S6