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How is this possible?!

Posted: Mon Dec 12, 2016 1:23 pm
by No Quarter
My wife drove the Beretta. She tells me it suddenly lost power to steering and the Check Engine Light came on. She drove on anyway fighting with the steering wheel (brave wife). Stopped to shop, when she came out all was fine again. It's back home now and works fine, I can't find anything wrong with it. How is that possible?

I checked for leaks, and belt is fine. Put some extra fluid in it, but it wasn't off the measuring thingy :unknown:

Re: How is this possible?!

Posted: Mon Dec 12, 2016 2:49 pm
by Slinky
Clogged PS line?

Re: How is this possible?!

Posted: Mon Dec 12, 2016 4:13 pm
by ifixalot
On my 94 mini van, about this time last year, I was driving home and my lights went dim and I saw the voltage was low.
Then it all of a sudden it came back up. I thought, alternator going bad. So I bought a new one and changed it out. Then the same thing
happened again. It was then, I discovered the water pump was leaking onto the serpentine belt causing the pulley of the
alternator to slip. My guess is your water pump might be starting to leak.
I don't know if low voltage causes an SES light? But maybe the engine light was related to low voltage but
your wife only noticed the hard steering?

Re: How is this possible?!

Posted: Mon Dec 12, 2016 6:07 pm
by 1988GTU
belt tensioner is about to bite the dust, or belt was caked up in ice.

Re: How is this possible?!

Posted: Fri Dec 16, 2016 10:14 am
by 3X00-Modified
If this happened when she was pulling into a parking spot then the car could have actually stalled... Those sound like engine off symptoms... no PS and the check engine light on. But if she actually drove a distance after the PS cut out then that's a different story and could be pointing to the accessory belt.

Re: How is this possible?!

Posted: Fri Dec 16, 2016 10:23 am
by No Quarter
She was driving and kept driving. And after that she's driven it for 3 hours without the problem reappearing. Go figure

Re: How is this possible?!

Posted: Mon Dec 19, 2016 5:36 am
by No Quarter
Several days of driving, no repeat of the problem. Strange. Replaced the water pump as I had it on the shelf, but didn't see any sign of the old one leaking. Have to wait for the next fail...

Re: How is this possible?!

Posted: Mon Dec 19, 2016 10:34 am
by ifixalot
Perhaps scanning for the SES code may offer a clue to what happened.
For example, misfire of one or more cylinders might indicate she went
through water which sprayed up into the engine compartment and caused
a misfire as well as the belt to slip. Then when parked it dried out and all was well again.
Except SES codes don't clear by themselves for a long time.
I assume yours went out right away?

Re: How is this possible?!

Posted: Mon Dec 19, 2016 10:44 am
by No Quarter
No codes immediately after the problem was present...