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VERY heavy steering all of a sudden 😔

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Old Mar 12th, 2019, 17:36   #1
AllHailKingVolvo
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Default VERY heavy steering all of a sudden 😔

Hi all,
This weekend I had a super successful 500 mile round trip in my 245, fully laden and towing a large twin axle trailer, the car didn't miss a beat.

However, I hopped in the car this afternoon to do the school run and found the steering incredibly heavy, as if the PAS was entirely non-functional. It's driveable (just) and fine at speed, but definitely not right. It hasn't lost any fluid, the belt is present and intact and turning the pump pulley, and the UJs on the steering column are lubricated (I give them a monthly squirt of WD40 followed by lithium grease as regular maintenance on both my 245 and 744)...any ideas as to what this could be down to?
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Old Mar 13th, 2019, 19:12   #2
Clifford Pope
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Try jacking up both front wheels and turning the steering. If it turns freely then the fault must be something in the power assistance - rack or pump.
If stiff, then a joint somewhere.
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Old Mar 18th, 2019, 17:59   #3
AllHailKingVolvo
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This is sorted as of today-the impeller in the pump was broken and only making intermittent contact with the shaft, so when spinning at speed it wasn't pressurising the rack. I managed to snag a new pump, bracket and lines from a breaker on eBay for £27 posted, all fitted now and the car drives beautifully once more!
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Old Mar 21st, 2019, 14:48   #4
rusty244
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Quote:
Originally Posted by AllHailKingVolvo View Post
This is sorted as of today-the impeller in the pump was broken and only making intermittent contact with the shaft, so when spinning at speed it wasn't pressurising the rack. I managed to snag a new pump, bracket and lines from a breaker on eBay for £27 posted, all fitted now and the car drives beautifully once more!
Good result. How did you diagnose the dodgy pump? Similar heavy steering symptoms on my 1985 but as I understand can’t try swapping out the pump on my 1990 as they changed quite a bit.
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Old Mar 22nd, 2019, 09:58   #5
AllHailKingVolvo
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It was a process of elimination more than anything-as the system consists of little more than belt, pump, lines and rack I started at the top and worked downwards...the belt was fine, so I picked up a pump and lines from an eBay breaker. As the lines were tricky to access, I decided to try changing just the pump first, which was a relatively easy job (half an hour tops) and thankfully that solved the problem entirely.

If it hadn't, my next suspect would have been blocked lines due to rubber degradation or some sort of failure. Failing that, it would have almost certainly been a rack seal failure, so I would have replaced the rack...although if that was the case, it's most likely that the PAS would have worked in one direction and not the other-in the case of mine, it was heavy both ways.
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