mk4 golf pas steering leak woes

Should be OK, but the steering will be very heavy, and you don't want to run the pump dry.

It sounds like the rack seals are leaking. The best answer is probably a new or reconditioned rack.

As for parts, try either GSF

Euro Car Parts or TPS will all do OE quality parts.

Hmm its literally 4/5 mins to the garage, I'm going to limp it there I think. 5 right turns and a mini roundabout so it won't be much turning. I think I might call the garage and ask if they can tow me maybe. Not sure what the procedure is for this situation or even call the aa back out and explain I tried driving it but its in too difficult or something and get a tow, I only have roadside cover not sure it this includes towing surely it does, must check the policy.

After much googling and reading on ukmkivs I think your right, the seals have given up and filled the power steering boot with fluid.

Gsf seem to be fair enough at £195 for the rack and £195 for surcharge which you get back.

How much labour time or approx cost would you think is involved in this job ? .. I only ask as I know your pretty well versed with VAGS as I noticed in your posts. Side note I just invested in a nice vag com lead from ross tech actually bought from gendan in the uk, very inpressed what you can do with it. Already used it to log live data of a dodgy maf and align a throttle body after cleaning.

I did however spot these on ebay what do you reckon worth a go or avoid like the plague (I'd appreciate your thoughts) :

and they are accepting offers.

while a bit cheaper than gsf/euro etc is the time of delivery and inconvinience of sending the old ones to them. whereas the other 2 it would be a case of just picking it up and returning old one in store.

what do you think ?

I guess the first thing to do is limp it to the garage and let them have a look them figure out getting the part to them and then leaving to the hard work.

it will be fine for a short journey, it takes 3.3 hours to change according to autodata, so depending on the garage about 90 to 300 quid to fit.

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Thanks for that MrC .. my local is about £54+vat for an hour plus £140 for the rack ... although they may need new rod ends of they cannot get them off the old rack. Looking quite costly labour wise I'm tempted to do it myself I have the tools and a trolley jack and stand, but its sat on a tarmax drive which I'm not sure is the safest to work alson I don't know how to jack the car up in the middle and where to put the stands, haynes wasn't too clear.

The job looks straight forward. Disconnect the bolt holding the the rack to steering colum from inside the car, which is just behind the foot rest. Then its a matter of removing wheels putting it on stands and undoing part of the subframe total of 8 bolts, although a breaker bar is probly needed for that I don't have one. Removing the under tray, disconnecting the rod ends, no doubt corroded to hell so needing a hacksaw or maybe disconnecting it at the ogther end and leaving in place on the wheel end? might enen aid towards keeping it all aligned. An basically get anything else out of the way to drop the pas rack out of the car and then a case of strip it off the subframe part and re-build new one on to the framing and jacking it up in to place and bolting it connecting it all back up in reverse, the hydraulics and pipes.

sounds exhaustive reading it back.... hmmm could be money well spent at a garage :)

probly an afternoons work of many days lol for me and few hours at a garage.

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you will also need an engine supporting system which ideally is from above. and get the tracking done. From what you have written I respectfully suggest it would be best to get a garage to do it.

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I appreciate your input and realise this is out of the scope of my basic skill set and when you right things like not sure where to put axle stands I guess this rings alarm bells :) .. I think your right and shall let the garage handle this one, for safety and for headache :). As always I value your input as we you are way more qualified than me. Its the cheap skate in me than fancies a go but I think it will end in tears and best left to a qualified mechanic. Sometimes its best to gracefully accept defeat and live to fight another day when its just a simple sensor to battle with hehe.

I think I might be possibly cheeky with the aa drive the car on to the side road and call them for a tow, more than likely I will need there help as the power steering will be goosed and through fear of risking the pump I don't fancy my chance with a 5 minute drive. As if that fails it will be more on the cost and not too much effort for them to tow me. Although not cheeky I guess as thats what I pay them for when my never failed before pride and joy acts up it might need a tow.

Time to go curse at the golf through the window :)

Thanks kindly as always Chris and Mrc :)

I got mine from Gendan too. VCDS is great: worth every penny. No idea on cost, but I see the ever helpful MrC has answered :-).

Personally, I'd do GSF/Euro: they're established and you won't have warranty issues.

I would. I don't know how hard it is, but there's bound to be a fair bit of dismantling and access will be tricky at home.

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Limped the car in to the garage this morning. He confirmed its the steering rack but the mk4 golf ones are not easily serviceable, it would need a replacement. He did say there are places that sell recon ones with new seal for cheaper but I need the car back as soon as I can.

Its £234 labour with vat and the rack is £200 from gsf. That includes tracking, fluid. But he said its anything goes wrong like new bolts needed or other broken parts he'd call me.

So its quite an expensive repair. As he's full he has it booked in for Thursday unless he gets any space before he will call me.

so £434 seems to be a fair price considering the other quotes I received from other local garages.

Its funny how you feel when you don't have the luxary of use of the car, quote disabling.

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On driving to the to the garage I didn't really notice any hassles with the steering ? felt normal. I was wondering if it would pass an MOT like this ? (hypothetically, am having the work done anyhoo) was just wondering ... as it wasn't too bad, I was expecting more of a wrestle.

I guess its basically turned in to a car with no power steering like the good ole' days.

My wife drives my car and constantly bashes approaching full lock and on full lock the ppoint of no more physical turns could this have dmagaed it ? or is this more of wear and tear of seals problem.

The garage offered me a deal an said it would be £180 inc vat / labour if I could leave the car with them as they are swamped and they would have it done b Thursday 5.30 and the rack was £140. I said no problem as I didn't need to car till the weekend. They're very good there have been doing all the cars hard jobs for the last 8 years now. So all in all it has cost £319.89 which doesn't seem bad for replacing a power steering rack ? (based in south England). The garage said its a 2 hour job which works out to 90 an hour. But they charge 54 + vat an hour so erm.. seems odd ? I wonder if they priced it up on the job not the hours ? I'll double check.

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power steering leakage is an mot fail. hitting full lock by turning the wheel should not damage anything. If it has lost all its fluid it will just be a bit heavier at parking speeds, rolling along you would not notice. having the system full of fluid but no pump working gives really heavy steering.

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No.

Reason for rejection:

"Power steering malfunctioning or inoperative or evidence that power assistance has been removed or disconnected when it is known that power steering is standard on the vehicle"

Autodata gives 3.4 hours for this job.

(It would help others help you if you would be kind enough to snip excess text from posts as I have done; TIA.)

Chris

Chris Whelan gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

WTF?

That is taking the piss. If I want to remove the PAS, I want to damn well remove it.

You can.

As long as you don't want it to pass an MOT.

Chris

Chris Whelan gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

Well, quite.

I mean - wtf?

I'm normally the one defending the MOT rules. But that's a piss-take. So long as I - the driver - don't find the steering too heavy, why shouldn't it pass?

For example - the Saab parked outside. RHD 900s always had PAS, aiui, but there were some early cack-handers without, and plenty of 99s. If I found a rack that fitted, or if non-assisted 99 racks fit (I don't know if they do) and I preferred the feel of the unassisted (say, for a road-legal trackday car), why SHOULDN'T it pass?

I would guess that replacing the rack with a non-assisted one should pass as the power steering system isn't disconnected, it's not there. Logically speaking of course, not based on any experience.

Tim

Tim gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

"when it is known that power steering is standard on the vehicle"

Probably a good reason for it then. ;-) I would guess that non-assisted models may well have different steering geometry to assisted models and just changing the rack may leave you with excessively heavy steering.

Tim

I was surprised to find that ordinary old fiesta classic has different bottom ball joint depending upon power steering or not, quite why I have no idea, but they are definitely different, the pin is about 2mm bigger on the PS type, which is not that easy to spot when you try and fit the wrong type !!!

"Mrcheerful" gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

Probably because of the greater loads which can be placed on 'em by more easily and quickly twirling from lock-to-lock whilst the car's stationary.