help. loosing steering fluid bad!

[Rob_277]

It's an 86gts. noticed the other day the fluid was low. just put some in it not thinking anything about it. today i jacked it up to see if i could find a leak and barely noticed some wet spots around the rack on the left next to the boot. well i went away from the car for almost 6 hours and when i came back i had a ton of fluid on the garage floor. upon inspection i found a lot more fluid around the boot. when i pulled on the boot i found a hole in the top of it, but just figureed it is a dust boot and that that wouldn't be a problem. but when i pulled on it it was full of fluid, which landed most of 3-4 ounces of the stuff on my face. hate when that happens. but the question is simply what is wrong. am i looking at a busted piston ring in the rack? i couldn't get to the screw on the clamp to get it off or i would have gone ahead and pryed around some more. if this is gonna be expensive to fix i'm officially screwed. this is already my backup car for while i'm fixing the monte carlo. anyone help please!

[Corolla101]

well if you do end up having to pull that thing out, you're looking at about 5 hours of mechanical work just pulling it out, and thats if you're fast

[Rob_277]

if it's out i'll just say fuck it and go w/o PS. i wonder how hard it is to bypass the pulley.