There is a kinda squealing noise coming from under my hood and it gets quiter as the car gets to running temp. I'm pretty sure it's the AIR pump is going bad or has gone bad. I'm getting an intermitent SES light. Anyway...

1. I've read that there was a recall on the AIR pumps in '97, the year of my T/A. Is it too late to take it and get it fixed if the AIR pump is the problem?

2. If I take the AIR pump off will the code it will throw hurt the way the car runs?

 

Have a buddy who has a 96impala ss just replaced air pump cause it was holding water in it and rusted out the shaft causing it to freeze up the shaft. made all types of codes come up, also he said it did effect the power the car was putting out. if you do have to replace the pump be prepared to put out at least $250+ he got lucky and know someone who got his at discount for $175

 

1. No, it's not too late, the dealer should be able to look up the repair history of the vehicle to determine that the recall was never done.

2. No, the air pump only runs for a short time when the car is first turned on and engine temp is low, or when the computer performs a self check of the air pump. If you remove the air pump the SES light will be on all the time but you will do no harm to the engine.

 

If it doesn't go away completely I don't think it could be the AIR pump, as stated above it only runs for a couple minutes when the car is first started and then shuts off. To verify you can unplug the electrical connector to the AIR pump and see if the noise still exists when you start the car.

My wild *** guess to the source of the problem is the idler pulley thing on the accessory drive belt getting weak/old, and is allowing some squeaking to come from the belt... Course it could be any number of problems, I'd look at that first...

 

I'm pretty sure now that it's not the AIR pump motor itself. I took the relay out and made a fused jumper and put it in and the pump itself ran fine. I don't know now if it could possibly be the relay or maybe one of the check valves or possibly something else all together. I'm gonna ride to Advance Auto here in a bit and get them to run the codes and see what comes up.

 

The code I got were:
P0171 System too lean, left bank on 4 sensor systems

P0174 System too lean, right bank

I'm sure this could be a few different things, but I don't know what to do at the moment.

I know it could be the MAF, MAP sensor, O2 sensors.