Steering lighter cold and harder hot

[RUM4MO]

Have they said how they will help cover the postage costs as you are not to blame for any of this, if it had been packaged well it would have arrived in good condition.

What were the "returns" conditions on the ebay listing, I tend to copy/print the original listing to avoid trouble later.

How do ebay help out in this situation, they must be able to help because if not, then anyone would sell damaged goods and send them out badly packaged and claim they were okay when posted?

 

[RUM4MO]

It does say the buyer pays for postage for returns, but that should only be if you changed your mind or asked for the wrong part, not for a part damaged in transit.

BTW they claim postage from UK to Portugal is under £10.

 

[dm222]

I guess that price is in UK when they have contract for the global shipping program or something like that...

The cheapest I could find:

46,80 €

Zona 2 Internacional 5-6Kg


i asked them what should I do...

 

[RUM4MO]

I see that they claim to be able to ship to lots of places including Portugal, so I would not think that this is the first time they have had to deal with these issues, it does seem very unfair that Portugal>UK is almost four times the cost to ship UK>Portugal. We also suffer a lot from that up in Scotland not being within the Londoncentric part of the world.

 

[dm222]

How the hell is this air getting inside the power steering the fluid is the same since last December...
It was bleeded twice since, and again today, so the thirth time in video. I don't have leaks...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bN_KjOriQrw

 

[dm222]

Well, I'm tired of driving a tank, so I'm going back to this.

Just ordered another used pump and let's hope it solves, if it does not at least I can exclude the pump from being the problem.

Let's hope this time it arrives in perfect condition.

 

[Sonofzelda]

I'd never get tired of driving a tank, especially if it was a PzKpfw IV Ausf G!

 

[dm222]

out of curiosity are there garages specialized in steering systems?

can't find.

 

[RUM4MO]

I would not think so, maybe still too small an area/sector of the repair market for anyone to specialise in, I'd be very surprised if your local SEAT dealer could not diagnose and give a price to fix this first time round. (or a VW dealer if they are closer to you)

 

[dm222]

I already went to the dealer twice, at first they said it was the connector to the pump, which they replace doing a really bad job and then I end up having to replace the whole wiring...

when the connector replacement didn't fix the issue I went again to the dealer and they said it's normal, that's what they all do when they can't fix.

what I suspect is that the gearbox is clugged with residues from the first pump but how to prove that?

and already went to two more garages and they just look and say they can't find anything wrong... not sure how to make them do real tests, here in Portugal most of them just want to change oil and stuff like that, that's what is lucractive for them (for exemple dealer charges 250€ for a simple oil and filter change), they don't want complications, so that's why I sugested if there is a garage specialized in it.

 

[dm222]

Here it is a comparison

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9Hxeu32sigs

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2e8jmZ1dsek

 

[dm222]

The pump already arrived but I did a visual inpection today and found this....

 

[SwinDan]

That's just a glob of grease you'll find it on all of the joints

 

[RUM4MO]

I've never ever noticed any grease escaping from any of these spherical joints, in fact I would think that there is normally very little grease in there at initial assembly and the rubber/plastic cover just keeps moisture and grit out of that joint.

So, has someone in the past, maybe even the last garage you visited not just opened up these TRE covers and tried to inject some normal wheel bearing grease in to try to remove any friction that was causing your steering problems - really just in an attempt to take care of any/all possible problem areas.

If this is concerning you now as maybe being a possible cause of the light/heavy steering, then I'd suggest that you remove these ends of both TRE from the hub assembly and make sure that they are free to move - but not so free that they could be worn, by doing that you could also check the same issue at the track rod inner end without any more dismantling.

Extra things that you could then do while these two TRE are disconnected is to jack up the front of the car and check how easy it is to turn the front wheels through their normal steering angles now that they are disconnected from the steering rack.

One thing, I would not expect that you can buy new self locking nuts of the same sort as SEAT fitted to these cars, everyone else in the VW Group stopped using that profile of nut and is now using one with a flange at the bottom to spread the loading area - I found that out when replacing the front struts on the late 2009 Ibiza - though I never tried to buy them from SEAT just my local VW Van Centre who could not buy them as they were on back order and remained so for 2 months, so I cancelled that order and bought what VW now fit to 6R Polo.

Your TRE looks very clean/new for that age of car, here in Northern UK, at that age, the TRE are a nasty rusty lump! Once you get these self locking nuts off, you will be able to release the taper bit from the hub assembly by hitting the hub assembly at the area that the TRE taper passes through with TWO hammers at the same time - as "opposite" each other as space allows. If you need to press down on the threaded section, refit the self locking nut upside down to protect the top of the threaded section.

 

[dm222]

RUM4MO
I'm sure that grease was not there last year and didn't go to any garage in the last year and half.

I hope to replace the tie rods, suspension links (same problem as the tie rods), all 4 dampers, as well as bearings and top mountings this month.

The car has 141.000kms so i think it's time.


It's a good time to do all those checks indeed

 

[RUM4MO]

Once you have checked each side for free movement through the complete steering angle, prior to removing these struts, the only thing that would need checking would be the lower swivel, the bottom link to the hub assembly. It would not be a huge job replacing them as I've said on the other thread, you will need to disconnect one of these lower swivels anyway when replacing the struts. Unless you are very accurate when refitting/replacing these lower swivels, you should get a proper four wheel re-alignment carried out to avoid destroying your tyres due to miss-alignment caused by this rework at the front end. Though if I were you, I'd hold back on the re-alignment until you are sure that the next pump clears your steering problems, as if all this work including swopping pumps does not sort things out, the only part remaining will be the steering rack assembly - as long as you have checked the steering angle/input readings behaviour using VCDS or similar, ie to make sure that the measured readings are steady and change with steering input demands.

 

[dm222]

Steering angle sensor was already replaced.

 

[dm222]

I don't want to create another topic for this so I will leave here:

I have this noise, but it's small and I can only hear it with engine turned off. It seems to come from the inner tie rod or suspension bar links, I think I have this noise since I can remember, cannot do the noise pushing the components by hand, only turning the steering wheel fast in oposite directions with engine off. Is it normal? Do you also have it? Wish I had another car to compare this little things...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEkGsFaSEJw

 

[RUM4MO]

I would think that it is one or both track rod inner joints that are causing that noise to be heard. If you can feel the same knocking when rocking the steering wheel side to side slightly UP AT THE STEERING WHEEL then that would confirm it I'd reckon.
As I said earlier maybe in another thread, once you disconnect the TREs you can then feel how they are wear wise, if the track rod falls down under the weight of the TRE then it is worn - in the old days, repair manuals would give you an "articulation force" to allow you to tighten them up to the correct point before drilling and locking the joint, nowadays, these joints are sealed but they are still the same design, so if the articulation force is low, ie you can move the TRE + its connected track rod easily, then that joint is worn and needs replacing.
After replacing both track rods and TREs on my wife's old 2002 Polo, I could not feel any free movement at the steering wheel.

Edit:- so years ago, when you could replace some parts inside these inner steering joints, you tightened the joint up and used a spring balance to check the load needed to move the joint away from its centre position, once the measured force, ie load measured at the end of the track rod on the spring balance (resistance to start moving) was correct, the housing on the inner joint was drilled and pinned.

 

[dm222]

but I don't have any free movement, the wheels move even if I move 1mm, I tested that. this noise is only when moving fast in oposite directions. seems like a really really small clearence because I dont have any free movemnt at all, maybe its normal with this car at some mileage, could you perform this test in one of your cars please?


what bothers me is that the noise is not comming from the outer tie rod at all, and if it is not normal the alignment will be for nothing as it will need another component replaced...