jeepmanman

Hello All,
I have been reading through the forums for a week now trying to find someone with the same problem. No luck on that yet, so I thought I'd ask.

I bought a 1990 Cherokee about 3 weeks ago. On the way home, my daughter turned on the AC and the engine made a thunk and she turned it off quick. By the time we got home, it was overheating (wasn't during the test drives), and when I parked it, it was dropping power steering fluid. The next weekend I tried starting it and it eventually started, running rough and needing help to idle, and finally just losing power, pumping the gas doesn't help, and not starting again for a while. The gauges all looked good. It didn't overheat this time, it just dies and doesn't run well, and continues to drop PS fluid. When I look in the PS unit it is all frothy. When I turn on the lights, the radio lights dim...

So, I am going to try again this weekend. I am wondering if it sounds like one thing or another to y'all? The lights make it sound like elec, the way it dies feels like fuel, and the AC and PS stuff make it sound like a bunch of stuff... Anyone ever seen one thing that can do all that?

1990 Jeep Cherokee 4x4
4.0 Auto, Limited (I think, P/S, P/W, P/L, Overhead Console)
191K miles

Thanks,
Craig

Throttle Jockey

tough call friend. there are too many things going on here to be all connected to just turning on the a/c. we may need to isolate each issue and try to resolve them accordingly.

jeepmanman

Thanks, I am going to dig into it this weekend and I'll post back what I find... I figure to start at the beginning, elec and fuel and work forward from that.

firstime00XJ

You have a lot of issues - turning on the A/C didn't cause them. The thunk that you heard was the A/C compressor cycling. Every car I've had thunked when the compressor cycled. The only issues that sound abnormal are the rough idle/loss of power and P/S. How dim is dim when you turn the headlights on? When Whenever headlights are turned on in a vehicle, interior lights dim down, that is normal. If I turn my headlights on during the day, I can barely read my odometer, when I turn my lights on at night, it is perfect. I don't know about if I'd be able to do the same with a stock radio, as I bought this with an aftermarket radio installed.

jeepmanman

So, not sure what made things work but some of them do now... Cleaned the battery cables, cleaned the ground, put in new plugs, wires, cap and rotor... still wouldn't even start with carb spray. It was closer to starting with the carb spray, but not there...

So, figuring it might be a fuel problem, changed the fuel filter. Still nothing... Even dropped a little gas down the carb to see, still nothing. Finally put the rest of the lawnmower gas in the tank and went to dinner. After I came out, it started right up, running well. Conclusions? Until I try fill 'er up later today, I am wondering if I fixed it but it was out of gas by then. Gauge says about a quarter, but who knows if it really works, it being a new car and all...

Next day, tackling the Power Steering issue. The PS whines badly, the reservoir fluid is all frothy, and it drops a lot of fluid. Figuring there must be some place, like a leak, that it is getting air, I decide to replace the PS pump, reservoir, and hoses. That done, I start it up again, same whine. I check the reservoir, frothy still and now I can even see bubbles breaking the surface. Effectively, I think it is maybe even worse than before. The only good news is that I don't seem to be dropping PS fluid anymore. So, the fluid level is good, and I am kinda out of ideas on this one... what makes it froth and why is it still whining? And, lastly, am I going to hurt anything other than my feeling by driving it like that?

Thanks.

jeepmanman

...anyone have any ideas on this? What else is there to in the PS system?

jeepmanman

When I put the old reservoir on the new pump, I noticed that there was no gasket, o-ring, etc on the reservoir-to-pump connector/pipe. Should there be? Judging from the amount of fluid that I need to replace that would be about right. I googled and hit some auto parts sites and it looks like there may be an included o-ring on some types of Jeep reservoirs but didn't see any for my model. If it needs that, any ideas on where to buy one quickly?

Thanks.