Now that the windshield is installed and cured, and the weather has been incredible for Chicago, I have been driving the car quite a bit. My wife and I took it out Wednesday and ran errands, went to lunch and just joy-rode it a bit. It ran and performed great, and came home parked it in the garage and went in. Later that night, I went out to the garage and saw a small puddle under the car, I lifted the hood and found the power steering pump front seal had let loose.
No one to blame but myself, I used the pump that was in one of the boxes of parts in the car when I bought it. As I was assembling the car and trying to get it running while trying to stay near the budget, I decided to use that pump. It didn't show any indication of previous leaks and the pulley spun smoothly, so I painted it up and installed it, what could go wrong, right? It did last almost 700 miles before the seal gave out, so that's not bad I guess.
I ordered a new pump and installed it yesterday but ran out of time before I could start the car and check for leaks but I think the repair is completed. I will start it and check it later this morning so I don't wake the neighbors too early on a Sunday morning, haha.
I was not sure if I liked the look of the old pump, it was a lot of black. I painted the pump cast iron gray and the pulley and the reservoir were painted semi-gloss black with the bracket painted low-gloss black. I thought that might be too much black, so with the new pump I intended to change it up a bit.
The new pump ended up coming with the pump body bare cast iron and the reservoir had a Cad-type finish on it. Since I intended to go with a different look anyway, I sprayed a satin clear over it all to protect the finish and installed it. I left the pulley semi-gloss black and repainted the bracket a low-gloss black again.
Of course, while it was off I couldn't resist a good cleaning and touch up of the area behind and around the pump, haha.
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This is how the used pump from the trunk box looked after I painted it.
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It looked good, just seemed like a lot of black in that one area. It is probably the most "correct" as far as how it would have come off the assembly line but I like breaking things up by changing the colors a little. When all the parts are a slightly different color even if it's just the finish, it breaks up the blending of parts. IMO, when everything is all the same color and finish, it can sometimes make it look like it was all rattle canned together in the car.
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With the new pump I simply satin clear coated it to protect the finish and installed it.
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Not sure how I feel about the new look but I am probably never going to remove this pump just to paint it a different color, so I am going to have to get used to it. It may be because the color is so near the opposite end of the color spectrum it is quite a change, I think it will just take time to get used to it.
During the restoration process, the steering gear was rebuilt and the hoses were all replaced with new ones. Now, with a new pump the whole system should be good for a a while.
Hopefully, the new pump will not leak and will function properly once I start the car and test it out.
