Hey all,

As some of you may know my EL came from the wars before i brought it. With
all sorts of leaks/noises/weird performance issues. Slowly but surely I am addressing
them and generally just trying not to bother anyone and figure this stuff out.. But...

Back story:
The other day coming from work i was getting pretty worried about my brakes, And I
don't particularly wanna see my car rammed up any other cars asses. And frankly with
peak hour traffic coming from work being how it is.. That would be fairly easy to do.

So since supercheap were doing a bathurst special (front and rears) for the price of one
I happily went ahead with that and changed them over. Brakes are real nice and tight
now so happy days.. A few days later coming from work again in the middle of the night.
My power steering starts to get pretty noisy and I can feel it slowly start to get harder
to turn.. My power steering has a front main seal leak id been meaning to fix asap but as
you can tell.. I'm working all the damn time. So i pulled into a servo and brought some
random transmission fluid apparently made for 4spd autos in the fords.. Poured some into
the power steering pump and tried to limp it home..

This is where the problems start:
On the way home i started to smell.. What actually smelt to me like burning rubber..
Luckily enough i actually had a copper right beside me at the lights as this smell
started to emit from the engine bay.. Why he did not pull me over after pulling up beside him
in a car that smelt like id just done a massive skid.. Is beyond me. But then it stopped..
So i kept going.. Had no tools or light on me anyway. Got it home and popped the bonnet..
Only to find even more smoke.. YAY.. Couldn't tell where from (too dark) So i left it. (note at this point i had power in the car)

Next day i tried to start it.. No power whatsoever.. Not even dash lights.. So i thought well.. Iv blown a fuse or something and went and brought a power steering seal kit, and a new belt.. Stripped down the pump and fitted the seals (fun job btw.. not too hard), replaced the belt, filled the fluid, and jumped the old girl back to life.. She started and ran..Smoked a bit (I put it down to burning off some old fluid that probably dripped on the alternator) But had no power steering. And every time you put your foot on the brake the "check abs" light illuminated. And to add to the fun and adventures of it all.. The power drained immediately after turning it off and attempting to start it back up..

SO.. iv obviously stuffed the alternator.. Am i up for a new pump too? Is the pump only not working because the alternator is not charging it enough? And why does it tell me to check the brake system for a power steering problem??

the power steering and alternator have no connection to each other, except for the belt running them..
in other words if the belt is on you probably lost your power steering fluid and it ran into the alternator killing it, and loosing all the fluid from pump has killed it to..

so it looks like you need a new alternator and power steering pump

You'll soon tell if your alternator is cactus by sticking a multimeter across the battery terminals and measuring the voltage... The brand new Bosch alternator I fitted to my car puts out about 14.4V at idle...

Check ABS could be happening due to an undervoltage reaching the ABS module and causing it to misbehave... I'd ensure you have good system voltage before chasing that too far...

Pump is mechanical... Alternator makes no difference to it... There is a torsion valve in the top of the rack and as you turn the wheel the valve opens and power steering pump pushes the rack across... You need to turn from lock to lock a few times when you drain and fill the power steering to bleed the air out of the system... If it still doesn't work you may have ran the pump too long without oil and killed it... The entire impeller assembly needs to be entirely immersed in oil to prevent it from dying...

Cheers,
Tim

Oh goody!!

Ok off to the wreckers tomorrow.. Hopefully the fellow there is feeling pretty generous. Maybe i can recover my new seals at least. Plenty of work ahead i guess. I did do the lock-to-lock thing when i filled it with the crap stuff from the servo.. But I'm guessing that probably made it leak even faster and really killed the alternator off.

Can't blame the car for this one, This is just a string of bad ideas and bad luck.

Thanks to whomever moved my topic.. Apologies for not putting it under the right forum.

Thanks again guys, I went wrecker shopping today and got the power steering pump.. had a few troubles with the alternator.. they didn't have any in the yard.. found one on the shelf.. came home and found out it was wrong size.. went back.. did the dance.. blah blah..

Finally got it all back together and its all happy days and big smiles here. Anyone got any tips for cleaning alternators? the new one i got is pretty rough and I'm not looking to do this dance again anytime soon if it can be helped.

Na they're a b**ch to clean out...

When I was doing my AU motor install the one on it was full of fluid... I pulled the rear cover off and spun it and it had a bent shaft anyway... So I was super delighted to throw it in the bin and replace it with a brand new Bosch unit for $220 off ebay... You'd pull your hair out trying to clean every last ounce of the stator and rotor windings as well as the regulator and brushes... Looks like the EF/El Bosch alternator is dearer but at $250 + post... Mine was $200 + post...

Otherwise yeah... pull the rear casing off and wash it out... If the brushes are badly worn into the communtator but you will experience difficulty getting them to slide off... Once you slide it off they pop out... To get the rear case back on you push the brushes back up into their carriers and slide a pin through the back housing (there is a hole) to keep them out of the way... You then fit the rear housing back on and pull the pin out and the spring back out against the commutator...

At least with the rear housing you can empty half a dozen cans of contact cleaner trough it and TRY to wash some of the fluid out..

Cheers,
Tim

Stator windings will be soldered to the regulator and will come off attached to the rear housing I think from memory,,,

Cheers,
Tim

I would have brought a new one.. at least you know it will last ages.. the wrecker one could only last a day or week who knows...

Id love to have done so, I prefer to have whatever is best of the best in my baby but its just not going to happen at this point in time. Been told its time to buy engagement ring before car bits.... Or else I get to spend a lot more time with my car... Sounds good but not really.

Plus i am more concerned with the welsh plug leak that useless gearbox mechanic managed to completely disregard. I'm sure this ones gonna make it through for now.. As i was reading your reply Tim i noticed there was a write-up here on disassembling and repairing bits inside the alternator so that may come in handy. As long as i don't put off power steering pump leaks in the future i should be ok.