A140 Steering Problem

[vfr4]

Hello everyone,

First post and its a rather sad one... Bought a 1999 A140/W168 with 87k miles and a pretty complete SH yesterday and drove it home no problems.

This morning my wife drove it to a site visit. Within a couple of miles the SRS light had come on and the power steering had failed.

A little digging here and on Lofty's site suggests the PS pump is electric and driven off the alternator, so there may be some connection between this problem and the car having sat for 6 weeks before we bought it

Any suggestions??

Thanks in advance,
Allan

 

[BlackC55]

Make sure the fluid level is good on the electric pump.

Check the voltage at the battery when running. 14.2V is to be expected. If the voltage is low I suspect the alternator to be faulty causing a low voltage to the power steering.

I hope this make sense. I am so tired

 

[vfr4]

Makes perfect sense, thanks very much

Hope you get off to sleep soon!!

 

[vfr4]

Voltage a steady 14.54/14.55 with the engine on. No increase with engine revs. Fluid was on the bottom of the dipstick.

Cheers,
Al

 

[vfr4]

Right,

Picked the car up from a local garage this afternoon, there was no diagnostic printout as there was no full diagnostic done - dont think the car would talk to the tester for some reason.

Good news is they sorted the problem mechanically!! the mechanic told me one of the joints in the steering had a lot of corrosion on it (RHS boot was all greased up, LHS boot had nothing except corrosion) so he freed it off and packed it with grease. steering back to normal.

Thanks for the help,
Al