List,

The car is a '95 940 with aprox. 70k miles. Runs great but has recently been making a terrible growling noise. I thought perhaps the water pump was seizing (coolant level was down a little bit) but when I removed the belt from the H2o and PS pumps, the H20 pump spun freely and had no noticeable play. I tried to spin the PS pump and it was noisy. I've never seen a PS pump fail on one of these cars, much less with only 70k miles! Any ideas what might cause the pump to fail prematurely? The car steers fine and the assist feels normal, but the noise.... So, who's had a PS pump fail? The fluid looks real clean (but reddish, almost like ATF) Thanks in advance-

Nathan A. Courtright

Dear Mr. Courtright,

May this find you well. My not having heard of a PS Pump failure proves nothing. At the risk of laboring the obvious, are the pump mounting bolts tight?
Is the face of the PS pump pulley parallel with the face of the crank pulley (could the pump mounting be twisted/skewed)?

If you're not the only owner, could a previous owner have let the system run low on fluid?

Have you checked the crankshaft pulley/harmonic balancer? This pulley has a rubber insert, between the center hub and the outer, belt-carrying surfaces. The rubber fails with time (rubber hardens and shears).

To check the crankshaft pulley, use white out. Draw a line from the inner ring across the face of the pulley. Drive the car. If one of the lines is displaced (i.e., there is no longer one straight line), then the balancer has failed. That might account for the noise.

I can't explain why the PS pump is noisy. Someone else will have to do that.

Yours faithfully,

spook