[1carnut]

I wanted to delete the power steering on my 97 Civic HX. I had read several threads that detailed removing or replacing the fittings at the rack, removing most of the fluid from the rack and then closing the system with a loop and/or breather. I recently did front and rear belly pans and did not want to remove the front pan to do the steering delete. Since I am somewhat snowed in today I thought that I would take a look to see if I could find another way to do the delete. I took the hose off from the fluid reservoir and drained the fluid. I then cut the other rubber hose near where it went into a metal fitting near the pump. This hose has a smaller metal line inside of it so I had to just cut around that and then pull the metal part out of that hose. I raised both front wheels off the ground and turned the wheel from side to side to force some of the fluid out of the rack. If you can, have someone do this for you so that you can catch the fluid as it is forced out. Turn the wheel slowly at first because the fluid can come out fast and go all over. I had a 3/8 X 3/8 ($3) hose barb that I used to join the two hoses together looping the system. I then removed the belt and pump. Since I haven't cleared the snow yet, I haven't been able to test it but I expect it to be very similar to the VX that I used to have that never had power steering. This mod would be somewhat difficult to reverse since i did cut the one hose. I assume that hose could be purchased separately and replaced or that things could be looped differently somewhere else but I thought I would throw this out there. I haven't even done a full tank on the belly pan changes yet so I won't know for sure what gains were from that mod or the steering delete. Plus we now have colder temps and snow on the ground.