2000 Disco 2, petrol.
So last week I'm driving on a very twisty road, (fully loaded with camping gear, roof tent, kid, water jugs - 12 gallons, etc) and this happened about 4 times:
On the gas coming up to a curve, let off the gas to slow down through the curve and it feels like the power steering just suddenly stops working.
The steering gets very hard, and then it just "turns on" again.
Freaking scary.

Anyone have this happen?
(I don't have a power steering leak, have not looked into fluid levels yet)

 

Has fluid in it, god only knows how old it is, but, that's weird right?

 

Did it make a squeaking noise?

 

No noise at all that I could tell!

 

So some research shows this could be a bad PS Pump.

$250 at FLAPS, and $350 for the Atlantic British Unit.

Do you guys believe they need the Special ACE fluid or can I just run normal PS Fluid? The Atlantic British guys recommend the specal LR Only fluid @$24 per quart for the cheap stuff.
Thoughts?

 

I am using Royal Purple power steering fluid. Pentosin CHF 11S is another option.

 

Do you also have ACE? If your D2 has ACE I think (not 100% sure) you need a different fluid. An easy way to check if you have ACE or not is if you have a tank with 2 caps but fill the same tank

 

That makes sense, No ACE here.

 

ACE or not, I don’t think you should use ordinary power steering. The Pentosin is expensive, but available from Napa.

 

I'm convinced!
The question is, do I preemptively replace the PS pump?