I saved a nice old lady that my lady works with over $1000. The power steering on her car was having issues. She took it into a shop and they gave her an insane estimate to fix. Over $1000. They wanted to replace the power steering pump and some other parts in the steering assembly. Told her it needed to be done ASAP. She declined and since she knew I work on cars she asked my lady if I could take a look at it.
It took me a couple seconds to figure out what was wrong. The damn belt to the power steering pump was so loose that I could spin it over the pulleys so it wasn't turning the power steering pump and if it was it was just barely doing it. I was surprised it hadn't flown off.
Went down to Autozone and grabbed a $12 belt. Took 30 minutes to put on. I had to loosen the alternator so I could remove that belt which was in the way but it was an easy job except for the tight quarters getting tools in to loosen the bolts that I needed to.
Anyway, the power steering works fine. I examined the rest of the steering and it was all good. Just goes to show how so many auto repair shops are in the business of ripping people off. Makes me want to go down there with the estimate and ask them how they came up with it. I'm not going to bother though. They know what they're doing and they're complete jerks for doing it.
The offending $12 belt that fixed the problem.
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