• Then the power steering pump developed a chirping sound at idle and I decided to replace the pump and install the new hose too. First thing was to remove the accessory drive belt by using a 1/2" breaker bar in the tensioner slot. Then came draining the power steering system. One can use a suction device to remove the fluid from the resivour, but when you disconnect the supply hose from the pump, make sure to have a suitable container below to catch the remaining fluid. Then came actually removing the pump. There are 4 10mm bolts that hold the pump to the block, 3 of them came out easily using a 1/4" drive ratchet. The other one was located behind the pressure hose fitting and was not accessible without removing the seized in place hose. Since power steering fluid is flamable, using a torch is out of the question. So I used a rotary grinding tool at low speed to cut through the metal portion of the hose. Even though I had drained the resivour previously, there was still plenty of fluid in the system to become airborne from the grinding wheel and give me a shampoo of power steering fluid. Anyways, after removing the last of the 4 bolts which hold the pump to the engine, the old power steering pump was maneuvered out of the engine bay. Now came the fun of installing the new pump I got from a wrecked (<1 year old) 2002 grand marquis located over 2000 miles away in colorado via http://www.car-part.com. Bolting the pump into place and installing the low pressure supply hose was easy. But getting the pressure fitting installed onto the pump was a big hassle because I still had the pulley on the pump, perhaps it would have been easier to install the hose if I first removed the pulley. Anyways, turning the front wheels got a little more clearance from the drag link & tierods, but it was still not easy. I used a combination of 18mm flarenut 3/8" drive "crows foot", 18mm open end wrench, and needle nosed pliers to get it on after much frustration. Finally it was time to put some fluid in the resivour and bleed the air out of the system. I had not yet installed the steering box side of the pressure hose and inserted the uninstalled end into a catch container. Then I disconnected the fuel pump by means of the inertia switch in the trunk and cranked the starter a few times. This did bleed most of the air out of the system, but things got messy and fluid splattered all over the accessory drive belt and pulleys. Finally installed the other end of the pressure hose onto the box using a 16mm flarenut 3/8" drive "crows foot". All was now together and it was time to start up the engine and look for leaks. Big problem though as the belt was coated in power steering fluid and I was getting a very loud schreeching noise from the engine. Besides the noise, I also observed that the waterpump pulley was very hot to the touch. Then realized that the belt was slipping around the accessories without turning them properly. Some engine degreaser and a low pressure garden hose helped, but the belt still didn't have enough friction against the pulleys. The belt was old and probably in need of replacement anyways.
• The new goodyear gatorback accessory drive belt that I installed as a replacement has a unique ribbed design to it that gets a better grip on the accessory pulleys than the factory motorcraft belt did. Used to notice that the headlights would dim, the climate control blower motor spin slowly, and the voltage guage dip for a little while after I'd driven through deep puddles of water. Also used to hear the accessory belt chirp sometimes during hard wide open throttle shifts due to sudden large changes in engine rpm from the firm tranny shift calibration of the police pcm. But both issues seem to have been resolved with the installation of the new belt.
  
• Note that one of the fittings on the pressure hose is 18mm and many flare nut wrench sets do not include this size.
• One decision when selecting another power steering pump was whether I wanted to keep the variable steering assist system functional. I could have installed a non-evo pump from another 4.6L equipped vehicle such as a 99+ police interceptor, mustang gt, or f150. But the constant assist pumps have to compromise between low speed maneuverability and high speed stability. So I chose to keep the evo system functional and acquired a steering pump from an evo equipped 02' marquis. The electrical connector was the same on both my 98' PI's pump & the 02' marquis's pump, as was the low pressure supply fitting, the pressure hose fitting, pulley, and other physical dimensions of the pump. A couple points of intrest about the evo system: if the actuator becomes unplugged or power is disconnected from the control module, the pump will continuosly run at full assist which will cause the vehicle to wander and likely damage the pump as well. The evo system in 02' and prior crown vics is essentially a standalone setup and a malfunction of the system will not illuminate the check engine light nor will it be picked up by plugging into the obd2 diagnostic port under the drivers dash because the system has it's own seperate diagnostic connector in the trunk against the drivers side quarter panel. 
• On the humorous side, I was testing the variable assist features of the evo steering pump that I had installed by sending the evo controller a bogus vss (vehicle speed signal). To see which setting of the frequency generator setting corresponded to which vehicle speed, I turned the ignition key on and fed the speedometer a bogus vss signal too. Found out the hard way that the speedometer needle will easily spin past the 140MPH markings and can get pinned against the black plastic casing. Suprisingly, the needle would not return to zero even after turning off the ignition key and I had to disassemble part of the dashboard to remove the instrument cluster cover and nudge the needle back to zero with my finger. If you connect a voltmeter to the evo actuator outputs of the control module behind the glovebox, you should see 0V when the car is parked with the engine running and around 6.5V when cruising at around 90MPH. Going faster than 90MPH does not lower the steering assist level any further, but it does lower the amount by which steering wheel rotation speed affects the assist level.