Has anyone taken their steering rack out of their IX, can you give me some instruction on it? The bentley manual doesn't cover the IX models. Also, what are people getting out of IX racks?
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i did one 2 days ago. covered it a bit in a thread on e30tech.
Mine was leaking at the pass side end seal. A stop-leak additive would work for a little while then it would leak again. The steering was also brutally hard to turn even though the pump seemed to be working fine and the belt was not slipping.
anyways it went something like this:
1. Jack up car
2. remove wheels
3. Support engine
4. remove airbox
5. unscrew engine mounts
6. unscrew hyd hoses to the rack and plug holes
7. pull back steering knuckle
8. separate tierod ends
9. separate outer CA balljoints
10. separate CAB brackets
11. remove swaybar(or just endlinks)
12. support subframe with a jack and remove the 4 bolts
13. drop subframe
14. remove DS tie rod end to remove the rack from subframe
15. install new rack onto subframe and raise back up with the jack.
16. install is reverse of removal
This pretty much worked for me but my outer CA balljoints didnt come easily so I removed the inners which were very easy. I also found keeping the bolts on the motor mount lower brackets(that are on the subframe) made it a lot easier to get the motor mounts back in.
The biggest thing I found was that my steering knuckle was almost seized. I pulled it out by undoing the nuts on the rubber flex disk and tapping it off the rack spline. When I had it out I could not rotate it by hand. I was lucky to have a spare one in good working order with a healthy coating of grease so I put that in then put up the rack. When raising the rack I found I had to check the alignment of the knuckle to the spline on the rack a few times to get it up easily.
Once the new rack is in, pour in some ps fluid, let it gurgle for a minute, then fill to the lone on the cap. Start it up and let it run for a couple minutes and turn the wheels side to side a few times(if front end is still up) or take it for a short drive making lots of turns. Top up an necessary. It will gargle a bit at first.
Out of curiosity. Whats wrong with your steering?
Cheers
Rob88 325 IX DiamantSchwarz - TOURING - waiting...
89 325 IX AlpinWeiß - Gone
88 325 IX DiamantSchwarz - Parted
89 325 IX RoyalBlau - Parted
88 325 IX RoyalBlau - Gone
88 325 IX DiamantSchwarz - Parted
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Thanks, this is pretty helpful. As far as I know there is nothing wrong with it, it's a parts car and i've got someone wanting the rack. The 2wd models look to be very easy to do, they're mounted under the cross member. My 2wd drive car has a leak, I'm thinking it may be in the rack, hope not, but I need to get under it and take a look.
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leaks tend to occur more at the pump and at hose fittings. One way to find out is to climb under and wipe everything clean. Take a short drive with lots of turn on slower streets(not highway preferrably) and check again. The leak should be more obvious.
To get the rack out of a parts car is really easy if you have the engine pulled first, but if not, just improvise on the outline i listed above. If your axles are pulled already you wont need to struggle with the control arms as you remove the control arm balljoints so you dont hyper extend the CV jonts. Oull it all apart as much as you can anyways, its a parts car and you'll be pulling that stuff off one way or the other at some point.88 325 IX DiamantSchwarz - TOURING - waiting...
89 325 IX AlpinWeiß - Gone
88 325 IX DiamantSchwarz - Parted
89 325 IX RoyalBlau - Parted
88 325 IX RoyalBlau - Gone
88 325 IX DiamantSchwarz - Parted
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