Steering Rack
Purchased some new parts for the steering setup.
The steering joint was worn badly at the bulkhead as its sits directly above the exhaust manifold. This closeness causes the steering shaft to pick up lots of heat, which in turn causes the seals to shrink, and the grease to become less viscous and leak out past the “shrunk” seals. Once the grease has escaped, lubrication is lost, wear occurs, and water gets into the bearings causing corrosion. Mine has visible movement with my hand and had a MoT advisory on it from an old MoT.
Like most 944 parts the replacement part is expensive at £350 for an original with the same issues, however JGM Porsche Shop sells a replacement unit for £235 with a £50 refund for your old unit which works out at £165. Their shafts are re-manufactured using bearings with high temperature grease, and high temperature seals to help reduce the problems of heat damaging the original design. The manifold could benefit from a wrapping but the space is too tight to do without removing the whole manifold and that opens another can of worms.
Replaced the track rob ends and boots as the old track rod end were rusted onto the arms and I had to cut the drivers side track rod end out of the steering stub axle. The replacement track rod arms I got from AutoDoc where too short and looked about the right size for my Mk1 Golf, I think they may have been for a 924 😖 so I had to use the original arms which involved a lot of heat and vice work with the massive Pipe Wrench
There was quite a lot of oil around the driver side front of the car and the majority of it was around the hoses connect to and from the rack. YouTuber NC944er has a great Power Steering Overview & Repair video which details what bit usually leak. Looking at mine it seemed to be all the connection with jubilee clips on that where leaking.
Replaced the Power Steering Suction Hose as its a cheap part at £20, the steering pump reservoir (Meyle does a nice replacement at £30) which accounted for 50% of the leakage. The power steering fluid was leaking from the bottom connections, pooling beneath the reservoir and dripping on to the suspensions, engine brace and steering rack. The fluid also drips down the pipes onto the steering rack and makes a right mess of the drivers side.
The other 50 % leak seemed to be coming from the power steering return hose that come from the rack to the cooler pipe, which is £124 from the Porsche shop, and from the return line to the reservoir which includes the cooler pipes are about £395 if you can find one.
These are the parts that 50% of the leak was coming from
Luckily both the connection and push on and secured with jubilee clips so trimming off the worn rubber and making both pieces a little shorter was done instead of sourcing new units. These lines are tapered down so if your cutting them back, cut as little as possible
The line that comes from the steering rack to the cooler also has a stop in the pipe so cutting makes it difficult to get the end fully back on the cooler. So this may need replacing if the leak continues. As access is easy it is worth the risk to save the £130 for the part.
The image below shows the connection to the cooler, I managed to get the pipe back on back to its original position but not 100% happy with the connection as there is a small gap left where the pipe should butt up to the cooler pipe.
Putting everything back together and centring the wheel and rack required some funky alignment process as I did not mark the unit when I stripped it down 😱 Measured the old track rod arms with the ends on and made sure the old ones where the same length and centred the rack before putting the steering knuckle back in place.
The steering wheel will need taking off and recentring as I put it on the flat bottom wheel when the rack was disconnected as I just wanted to see it in place.
The steering rack connects to the engine beam using U clamps, so don't fully tighten them up until you have the front and back bolts in, as you need a bit of wiggle room to align them at the back.
Used the instructions here for flushing the system, got a vacuum extractor from Amazon, attached it to the return line and and emptied the fluid out the system for under £30 Shoze Manual Vacuum Oil Pump 7L Fluid Extractor Suction Pump Oil Petrol
The steering column needle bearing was a bit noisy, this is because the clutch master cylinder fluid had leaked straight into it when the seal went. I cleaned it out as best I could and strayed some lithium grease into it to help with "da lubrication" A replacement unit it £400 and you have to strip the bottom part of the dash out so a replacement was off the cards. Luckily the seal popped while the car was in storage for two weeks and I managed to clean out the brake fluid when I tried to move it, so cleaned it off with with some brake cleaner so I think its just running dry and not that worn 😁
