Jump to content
Sign in to follow this  
smokenbaby

Tight or sticking steering

Recommended Posts

While doing my 2.5 conversion, the mighty E30 was stationary for a little over two weeks (waiting for lost parts to be either replace or turn up). In the process or the conversion I thought it a good idea to locate and fix a couple of water leaks in the front. One of the leaks was around the steering column mount at the firewall. There is only a foam gasket that is for sealing, this was shagged and the only thing I could do at the time was use urathane as a sealing medium. This meant removing the mount and applying urathane to the firewall and re fixing the mount.The following day when I took the car for it's first drive I could hardly turn the steering it was so tight. After a bit of movement left to right I decided it free enough to drive home from the workshop. After about 20 minutes it was that tight I thought the end was neigh due to acident. Managed to get it home safely. Now, I was fully expecting to find urathane had seeped into the lower bearing and causing it to become tight. After pulling the column out I soon found no trace of urathane. The bottom column bearing had actually siezed in the two weeks the car had been off the road. The source of water getting into the bearing is the sock drain on the drivers side of the scuttle panel. The water runs out of it and straight into the column. Water getting stuck in the bearing had caused the seizure.

I would seriously recommend all you E30 owners to check this and clean and grease the bearing. This has now made my steering super smooth and what was once irratically thight is no longer.

Edited by smokenbaby

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Hmm worth a try on mine. I havn't properly diagnosed the issue yet, but was thinking rack - maybe it's that bearing cheers.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
Sign in to follow this  

×
×
  • Create New...