Steering lost while driving..

[Zap]

The other day it was quite cold out and in the midst of returning home I suddenly lost power steering. Further inspection determined that all the fluid was lost, and that there is a drip at the driver's side by the bumper. I presume this means that a rubber hose broke near the steering cooler, but I don't know the anatomy of the steering system real well on the V8.

Is this hose replaceable by itself, or will I require an entire replacement line assembly? Any help is appreciated so I can get things running again before it gets too cold to work on!

 

[hawkeye18]

If it broke before the metal part of the hose, then you can just cut it off and use a male/male hose barb (I wanna say 1/2") and use another length of hose to go to the cooler.

 

[Mr Anonymous]

It's possible the hard line that runs along the drivers inner edge of the subframe rotted through. You'll see that even the hard line has rubber sections on either end.

Wherever the failure occurred, it'll be easy enough to fix with either with a barb as mentioned, or even if it's the hard line you can use a flare tool to make a flare in a clean part of the hard line and replace it from that point on with hose (the flare gives the hose and clamp an area to grip and keep from popping off).