I had the exact same situation with my '87, except it
was my original power steering pump. No big loss, as
it didn't leak a drop of fluid and never did provide
much power assist anyway. However, even though there
was no radial slop, you could pull the pulley out a
little and snap it back like a bra.

Next time you squeal out, turn your steering wheel
back and forth and note what happens.

Sam

--- George Goff <THX0001@AOL.COM> wrote:
> In a message dated 2/13/03 10:04:47 PM,
> jasondenton@ATTBI.COM writes:
>
> <<  . . . I just replaced all the belts and the
> problem persists.   . . .
> Any ideas?   . . .
>
>
> 1).  Is the water pump going? >>
>
> Jason,
>
> I had this problem once.  Occasionally on starting,
> the belts, or so I
> thought, would produce a squealing sound from the
> very bowels of hell.  I
> went through the drill of installing new belts and
> tensioning them properly
> before I noticed the excessive axial float of the
> water pump.  It was a
> fairly new one of those
>
why-spend-the-extra-money-it-is-as-good-as-the-OE-part
> pumps from you know
> who (name withheld because I can't abide the endless
> babble its mention will
> provoke).  The squealing was from the chatter as the
> errant impeller milled
> away the engine case.  What threw me was that the
> defective water pump never
> leaked a drop of coolant and it had no radial slop.
>
> George

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