hey all, i'm deborah. i drive an '03 Lancer ES, that i've had since Nov '04. it was a rental car @ a mitsubishi dealership before i got it. i'm at 50,XXX miles (full time college, full time work, lots of driving), and i had my timing and ps belts replaced about 9k miles ago. ever since, i've had this grinding noise whenever i turn the wheel all the way in one direction or the other, and it locks up. i was told that the tension might be set wrong, so i took it back to our friendly family mechanic, who told me that my car was actually the first mitsubishi he had ever worked on, but he said he'd done it right.
well, for the past 4 months or so, i've had this problem with driving in the rain. if i hit a puddle, my steering locks up and it makes that horrible grinding/scratching/squeaking/SCREAMING sound, and i have to hope that traffic lets me drive in a straight line for the next 1/4 mile.
long story short, i'm supremely pissed at our "family mechanic" for being an ignorant redneck and not giving me the heads up on his lack of knowledge (i was asking him about mods and he gave me some generic bs), and i'm hoping that it's not anything serious that's wrong with my car.
i'm taking my car to a dealership next week, but i want to make sure i don't get ripped of for a) being dumb, and b) being a girl.

~deb

 

Hey, welcome, sorry to hear about your experiences, its happens to everyone. =\ But the power steering tensioner shouldnt be a big worry, unless it looses up the belt, then you should get it replace. It controls your ac and power steering. I hope the dealer fixes the problem with out charging you an arm and an leg.

 

Welcome as well... Anyways, you mentioned that this problem only occurs when raining right? If so, it's the belt/pulley getting wet and thus causes slippage. The slippage both causes the squealing noise and the power steering to seem to lose function. But steering is still there, but the "power" part of it isn't.

Best solution, replace whatever factory plastic "shield" from underneath the car is missing. That'll probably do yah !

PS : Fire the mechanic and always come to us... LOL

 

k, so if that's the fix, how much will it cost me?

 

that item is something you'll probably have to get from your local dealership... you can probably expect it to cost an arm, leg, and first born child.

 

k, so... good/bad idea to check a junkyard..?? we've got 2 places that are HUGE, and they've actually got some really good parts. i've been to one of them, and where they keep all the imports i've seen about 5 or 6 lancers. would it matter a whole lot if it was the same year?

 

OK first you need to look at your car, its def a slipping belt but you may have all the plastic sheilding under there. Mine does it sometime when i hit a HUGE puddle, it just splashes around the plastic sheild. However if the tensioner was set wrong and that belt got stretched then its not going to tighten up again. A new belt wont cost you that much but if you can avoid it dont go to the dealer, they charge on average 10-15$ more an hour then most mechanics. They call them sstealerships for a reason. And im sorry please dont think im sexist but if you can have your dad or brother or bf go with you, shops do it to my mother and my wife ALL the time, some dumb mechanic sees a woman and the estimate goes up 50-100$ . . . then i walk in and back down it goes after alot of dumb explanations (and me looking PISSED) goodluck and feel free to ask as many questions as you want here, we deal with newbies all the time hehehe

 

thanks chaos. yeah, the dealership i go to know who i am.. cause i went in to have my oxygen detectors replaced, after i had called a few mechanics and got quotes. i called in, scheduled an appt, they ordered the sensors, already knew how much they were gonna rip me off, then i go in, go all crazy mad asian woman on them, and they were pretty much like "oh shoot, she's not dumb"
so.. yeah, but i totally get what you mean about girls being ripped off. i told a guy once that i like getting ripped off about as much as he would like me to rip his ***** off, and he's never bothered me since
anyways, wednesday i'm going to get it checked out. i'll let y'all know the deal then.
thanks for the suggestions!!

 

So ahve you looked into that general area? Is there plastic coverings all underneath? And as Chaos said, it could still do that but less likely. The tensioner if the second point of attack if the shielding is still there...

BTW, I love that comment on being ripped off... LOL

 

i completely forgot to mention checking junkyards--that is a great idea.

as for the belts, and even the tensioner... it's an easy install. the power steering belt tensioner is the harder of the two to work on, but if you can get underneath the car, or at least have someone slide under there and put their hand on the tensioner it should be easy.

the alternator belt tensioner is stupid easy to take off/replace. give both of your tensioners a crank if you think that your belts are too loose. there should be SOME slight play, but not a lot.

 

exact same thing happens to me all the time. Also if you rev your engine high enough the belt will slip and squeal too.
Its not a big deal, just need to change the belt. I haven't gotten around to it yet. The belt only costs like $10, and if you take it to a mechanic its only about an hours work.
If you wanna see the problem, pop the hood, and get someone to rev your engine real high, really quickly, then look at the belt on the left, you will see it jump off the pulley a bit, thats what is causing the noise and the steering to go.
It happens to me early in the morning aswell, from the dew. And also during the day when it gets too hot, makes my A/C go down, and throws off my steering.............i really should get it done. lol

 

thanks guys
yeah, slvroz, i haven't even had time to look... so exactly what does this piece of plastic look like? do i need to slide under the car? if so, then i'll just wait till Wed. no need in me rubbing my face all in the underbelly of my car. we're close, but not that close.

 

Anyone else confirm that there is a plastic shield underneath the passenger-side engine bay area to guard from the rain? Think mine got ripped off in an accident and not sure it was replaced...

The plastic is just molded (black) around problem areas that can attract rain and other sorts of debris. You should be able to just look through the engine comparment I'd think?

Good luck!

 

yes there is a guard, on both sides.

just look underneath the engine bay, its very noticable. there are two of them. one on the drivers and one on the passenger side.

 

Those aren't just the wheel well liners are they? If not, those are exactly what you'll be needing.

Junk yard for sure...