steering loose with massive amounts of play

[rubezz]

my steering was loose with massive amounts of play in the wheel, making the steering feel elastic and non-responsive.

i got it tightend in a garage but it just loosens up again after 2 days. it is better than it was but fine movements are loose.

u can feel it isnt firmly tightend when u go over pot-holes.


when i first got it back from the garage the wheel was very tight - more than it should be - but when slightly turning the wheel, just fine adjustments - that still felt loose, even though the wheel itself was actually quite hard to turn.


does anyone have a clue what is wrong here?

how hard a job is tightening the steering? maybe something else is wrong with it other than what the garage "fixed".

(there was also a seperate problem of alignment, it was pulling to the left but that got sorted before the steering was tightend)

any help would be greatly appriecated!!

 

[rubezz]

noone any idea? the wheel judders at 60-70mph +

looks like its ready for the scrapheap

 

[UncleFester]

Power steering gone, rack gone, balljoints / track rod ends gone ... could be any or all of those things. Hardly a reason to scrap it!

 

[millzeee]

mine is the same, i took it into the dealer to sort it and they basically said there was nothing wrong, which i wasn't to happy about. So they let me take out a couple of R's they had and they were all the same which to me doesn't make it right so i had a chat to the mechanic and its basically a piece of rubber in the stearing linkage which loosens up.

In fairness its not that bad but as i have had the car fron new i notice it. Anyone else that drives it doesn't notice so i am not that worried. The cars done 46k, i imagine by 100k it will be quite bad

 

[UncleFester]

I think you can get a replacement polybush from that - not sure how much of a pain it is to change though.

 

[jonjay]

My friend had this...have you pulled the wheel right out? If you push the wheels all the way in does it tighten up?

 

[rubezz]

the garage tightened the steering up but was loose again a few days later and at 70mph the wheel shakes pretty violently..

i dont image the garage would do anything different if i took it back. it was too tight when i got it back but still loose at fine turning/adjustments.

is it an inherent defect?

also whats a polybush?! cheers!

 

[rubezz]

My friend had this...have you pulled the wheel right out? If you push the wheels all the way in does it tighten up?

not sure what u mean but the steering isnt sharp/responsive. almost like elastic - the more you turn the better it bites in - im sure i need to turn the wheel more than normal to get the steering to bite in enough to get the wheels turned enough..

im also sure that when stopped, turning lock to lock, there is a certain position on the wheel that feels a like 'on ice' - very floaty. and im sure its more to one side than the other. dont know if that mean anything..

 

[jonjay]

You can adjust the wheel basically. If you extend the wheel towards you to its max then it is known to loosen up....

 

[dainott2105]

mine is making a high pitched wining noise when im turning the wheel and wondering what it is. Not loosing fluid but dont want to change the pump and find the noise is still there. Dont suppose it would show up on VAG-COM either?!