Within the last 2 weeks I have noticed that I must have a slow leak in my power steering line because I have had to add power steering fluid 2 times in a week. I hear the undeniable noise when turning my wheel. I open the hood and the fluid is almost totally empty. Now being a girl with no automotive knowledge beyond the basics I wanted to have the car serviced. My father hands me some transmission fix a leak fluid and tells me this will work even though it is for transmissions. Now my father is not of the handy type at all. So I am hesitant at using this stuff, but my conservative side says " hey it’s a cheap fix". So has anyone with any automotive knowledge used this fix? Will this cause any issues being that these are two different types of fluid? And if you have used this and recommend it as an alternate solution, what amount did you use? The bottle’s directions are for transmissions not power steering so a whole bottle of this stuff seems a bit much for my use.
What you have is probably a leak of the seals in the steering box.
There are two basic types of leak-stopping gookum. One, which is mostly used for radiator repair, is flakes of semi-solid gunk, which is carried to the point of leakage and forms a clot there. Works fairly well for non-moving parts like radiators and heater cores.
The second, used for transmissions and the like, is some chemical which is intended to attack the rubber of the seals, causing the seal to swell and giving a tighter seal. Of course, swelling the rubber also softens it, and if the seal is a dynamic one (that is, it seals between two moving parts, like, say, the housing of your steering rack and the moving part of the rack) the seal is going to wear faster. So this type of sealant is purely a temporary measure, used to give you time to get to a mechanic or sell the car to some poor sucker.
Since (I think) you have a leak of the steering box seals, the first type wouldn’t work; the movement of the parts would dislodge the “clot” and it’ll just start leaking again; and the second type, though it may work for a while, will eventually result in the seal wearing our completely and leaking like crazy. Actually, given that you’ve run the system dry a few times, your seals are probably shot already.
If I were you, I’d dig up the money to take the car to a mechanic and get the problem fixed properly.
As Rocketeer mentioned, if the stop-leak product works, it only buys you some time, and then you’re likely to have worse leakage than if you hadn’t used it. And it might not slow down the leak at all, but will still shorten the life of some of the seals in the system.
If you were to use it, I would guess that 1/4 of a bottle would be a reasonable amount. I think you’re right about the whole bottle being excessive.
Typical power steering leakage items are the pump body seal(s), the pump shaft seal (the only one that the stop-leak stuff is likely to help with), the hoses/lines, and the rack. There is quite a range of repair costs among these (likely 100-800).
If the leak is not a gusher, and doesn’t get worse, you may be able to nurse it along for quite a while. But don’t wait for symptoms like noise or stiff steering – at that point it could be damaging the pump and/or the rack. Check it every few days and top it up before it gets too low.
You can find out which part is leaking. Thoroughly wash the pump (the thing the belt goes around,) the hoses, and the steering box (the thing at the other end of the hoses.) After a few days, dab at these parts with clean paper towels. The leaking oil will show on the towels. Once you know what is leaking, you’ll know what to get fixed. The hoses are the cheapest of the three parts.