Steering problems....

[Chad91Q45]

Ok, so I drove my Q to work for the first time today and I am having a few steering problems I think.

Last night I apparently parked ****-eyed with one wheel on a 4x6, the other on flat ground (my Aunt whom I am staying with for the summer to work kinda lives in teh ghetto).

So starting it up, no problems, no noises.

Up until 35, no problems at all.

From 35 on, it kinda of shakes like tires are out of alignment.

Once I get on the highway and I am doing 60, there is a high pitched whirring noise and the wheel is ****eyed, too, once again making me think that the tires are out of alignment, but I pull over because of the whirring noice.

Pop hood, nothing unusual. No smells, noise is gone, everything looks peachy. Only have 3 more miles to work, so I let it slide for the time being.

Get off highway, done to city speeds, once again at 35 or 40, the shaking and whirring noise disapear.

Park car at work, notice a little bit of smoke coming out of the engine compartment. My temperature and oil had stayed fine. Pop the hood to try and see where smoke is coming from. Appears to be coming from drivers side, far back in the engine, and kind of deep down, or at least not right on ethe surface.

So any ideas what could be causing this? I am wondering if maybe the whirring noise was the HICAS that it was being activated since I was having to hold the wheel ****eyed to drive straight, possibly from misaligned tires.

What should I do in the meantime? I am going to check powersteering fluid and make sure that is fine. Is there an easy way to disable HICAS and the powersteering?

Please help!

[Chad91Q45]

didnt realize that ****-eyed would be filtered.... substitute in "off center" on both instances i guess.

[Chad91Q45]

and the smoke smell was not oil, was not coolant. Those are really the only two smells I know well. Smelled somewhat electronic, making me a think, along with the whirring, that a motor was being pushed too hard.

[Chad91Q45]

Ok, I just got back from lunch. During lunch, I sat in the car and had it running. When I turn it on, the HICAS is already lit as if it is on. A little strange...

Let it sit there idling for a while, everything is fine for 25 minutes. Then I get a wiff of smoke, jump out and pop hood. Smoke is coming from back of engine, drivers side, but I couldnt see where exactly it is coming from. I have never smelled brake fluid smoke, but this is what I imagine it to smell like. Brake fluid is full, though.

Please help!!! I dont want my car to be dying this soon!

[elwesso]

Alright... Can you see the smoke coming likeup from the exhaust header???

FYI. When the HICAS light is on there is some sort of malfunction, i dont konw if you knew that or not...

If it were from the front i would suspect a power steering hose leak..... If its dripping down there you would be able to see a leak from the brake lines onto the header...

[Chad91Q45]

I did not know that when the HICAS light was on that meant there is a malfunction.

I looked for any leaks but could not see anything.

Could it be that my HICAS is reacting improperly and is causing my swaying? Is there a quick way to disable it (like pull a fuse or unplug a cable) that would allow me to see if not having the hicas on would solve the problem>

[Chad91Q45]

And for that matter, would there be a way to easily disable power steering? I have been without it for the last month and a half anyways (on my 90 nissan pu... no power steering) and just try and simplify everything as much as I can so I can attack the problem 1 system at a time?

[elwesso]

If HICAS light is on, its not working! If it detects a malfuntion it goes into failsafe which points the rear wheels normal.....

I dont konw if thers a HICAS fuse but might chekc the engine compartment box and the passenger compartment box... no way to disable power steering..

If you can tell me where its dripping it would help me...

[Chad91Q45]

Oh, gotcha.

I will check it when I get home today (it takes a while for it to start dripping so I will have to wait for that to happen). Guess I will just have to keep a supply of power steering fluid on hand until I figure out what it is....

But could having my power steering going out possibly cause my car to shake at high(er) speeds? It doesnt seem like it could to me... And do you know what sort of smell powersteering smoke would have?

Thanks a bunch!

[elwesso]

Powersteering fluid is ATF... It smells similar to oil (yes I have lit ATF on fire, dont ask).....

I dont think so about having PS go out...

You said that your car was parked on a board, correct?? So its possible theres a dent or something in the tire causing it to be out of round.....

[Chad91Q45]

Ok, that very well could be the ATF fluid then. It didnt smell like oil, but at the same time had an oily smell (dont know how else to write that... it didnt really have the noxious smell that oil does, but had the kind of musky smell that it had). It smelled almost electrical, but not quite...

One last question for the time being, where is the ps fluid resevoir at? I did a brief looking when I popped the hood but needed to get back in from lunch.

Thanks a bunch!

[elwesso]

On the drivers side, toward the front of the car. IIRC its mounted to the strut tower... It looks like a dark green cottage cheese container with a small screw on lid.....

[Chad91Q45]

Looks like I filled up the right one, then.

So when I left work, I checked the fuses and the fuse for the HICAS wasnt in, so I tossed it in, but the light remained on. So I drove it to schucks, popped open the hood, checked the power steering, and it was really really low. So I went inside and got some of the leak stop power steering fluid stuff (biggest waste of $5 probably, but I figured it would be an easy way to check if it was the hose). Poored in about half of the thing, and drove. I could tell the PS was actually working now.

Made my one stop i needed to, no smoke. Drove back home, turned it off, a few minutes after I stopped it, smoke appears, and resevoir is near empty. Fill it up again.

The fact that it took time makes me think that it deffinately IS a hose, since it seems other wise it would be rather immediate. I mean, unless there is a huge hole in the power steering pump, i would assume it had to be on for it to be leaking without it running, although I am often wrong on that sort of thing. The sound I heard when driving to work today really did sound like power steering that is old, but I just didnt think about it being the noise.

So my next question, if I let the power steering resevoir go dry until the weekend when I am able to look at it from underneath the car to try and find a leaky hose, will I do any damage? I dont want to burn a power steering pump to go along with having a leaky hose....

[elwesso]

Look at it this way... if youve been driving with no PS fluid for a while all the damage is already done, how much worse can it get?

I dont konw what the ill affects on the rack without fluid, but I cant imagine it ebing good... however there should be residual fluid in there so it should be OK for a while...

I am thinking one of 2 things, or possibly both.... You either have air in the system or you have a leak. if the leak is as big as you say, it should leave a nice puddle..... Most normally the hoses go bad and they blow, I think anyway.. At least the high pressure hose does.

I would keep trying top it off and maybe you can get it to be better... if you have air in the system it will be full and then will go down as it eliminates the air.....

[Chad91Q45]

Alright, I will keep doing that. Getting any hose done is at cost for me (have a friend that works at a rental yard that makes custom ones), so probably $10 w/ the connections. If it is the pump, how much do you think that would be? It looks like this side of the engine compartment is a little roomier than the passenger side, so I should be able to get all the stuff done on my own, just a matter of the actual pieces.

[Chad91Q45]

Ouch. Checked out everything nissan and it looks like $450 for the pump if that goes out.... lets pray its just a hose.

[elwesso]

Acutally the pump is no big deal.....

The rebuild kit for htem is about (edit) $10 or so, nothing major.. Then you take it out of the car and replace the stuff according to the FSM..

I would easily rebuild a PS pump in a day or so I think..... A few hours to remove, a few hours to rebuild it, and a several more hours for break time (read BEER) and replacing hoses and such...

[squeefoo]

Thats hard on the rack. If you spend $40 on fluid it's a lot better than replacing the rack -until you get the hose fixed. Plus if you run the pump dry you can shove all kinds of metal into the system, which to me would really suck when little gremlins appear in the HICAS. Leaks, wiped out seals, and rack bushings.Keep it wet, it's cheaper in the long run. I'd run a magnet in the reservoir then take the res. off and clean it real good until the magnets clean.

[Chad91Q45]

I went ahead and just let my car idle for about 1 hour tonight. After about 30 minutes, I got a hint of the smell, shut her off, and poored some more of the sealing transmission fluid in (god I hate using that stuff.... always know that if it is sealing a hole, it is clogging something else up too....).

Let it run for 30 minutes, smell lingered but no smoke visible. Pulled back, ground was clear of any liquid, pulled back forward. However when I shut her off for the night, i opened the resevoir one last time to make sure it was full enough, the fluid was looking darker than I thought it should. I will check again in natural light (sometimes artifical really plays tricks on ya) but assuming it is darkened, I am guessing that would mean I need to drain it all and fill fresh? What possibly could cause it to get darker (assuming that is possible).

The car HAD been parked for about 9 months before I bought it. I changed oil and everything but didnt think about the PS fluid. Could just sitting cause it to do that?

[Chad91Q45]

Oh, and the HICAS light is off now, too..... maybe that was really thirsty and was what caused the drop in fluid the second time? (I know, Im grabbing at straws here, but I can hope, right)

[elwesso]

It still sounds like you have some air in the system its the only thing that I can think of to describe this problem...

Its possible it was just thirsty....

Heres what I would do.. Assuming you can get the fluid level to stabilize, I would do the standard NICO procedure of a PS fluid flush.. Take a turkey baster and suck all the fluid out, then refill... Do this every day for a week and that should get most of the old fluid out and leave you with fresh...

[Chad91Q45]

Alright. I will start that process as soon as it stabilizes.

Today driving to work it was even better. The HICAS light did not go on at all (first time since I got the car... so I had always assumed it was supposed to... guess I was wrong there!), the shaking was still present but a lot better (so it probably was just tires being out of alignment, I will get the balanced today after work and rotated). I took a longer drive than normal just to give it a full chance to heat up. About 40 minutes after I started the car, I parked, there was a slight smell and just a waft of smoke when I opened the hood. Fluid was near full level.

So we shall see. I noticed a tiny amount of fluid dripping down on my resevoir, and i dont think I spilled any on it, but it is possible. I wiped it down and if any more shows up, that could very well be the source of my problem (it would leak, travel down hose, at the hoses lowest point drip onto the headers. Sounds plausible to me).

Glad this problem isnt looking as bad as I initially thought it may be.

[squeefoo]

I still think you need a new hose. They go bad on these often. Mine did. If you take the hose off the side of the res., (the return line) you can add some hose and squirt the whole system into a bucket, while some body pours fresh in. Better yet crank the wheel back and forth while you flush. Peace of mind. Does the pump make noise? I think the fluid out of the reservoir is foaming from the air mix, from being low on fluid. Just my .02

[Jesda]

My high pressure hose went out, and it may be leaking again. Or its the return hoses. Its a minor leak, uses up a quarter of a bottle of PS fluid every week or two. When its low, I can feel and hear a light buzzing through the steering wheel.

-Jesda

[Chad91Q45]

The fluid in the resevoir has a normal looking consistancy... I havent seen any foam.

I will continue to add the fluid as needed until the weekend. If it stablizes, I would assume that means I am leak free? If i continue to lose fluid and have smoke, then I assume that means I have a leaky hose and it needs to be replaced. Does that sound right?

[elwesso]

Sounds like you all over it chad!

[squeefoo]

My high pressure hose went out, and it may be leaking again. Or its the return hoses. Its a minor leak, uses up a quarter of a bottle of PS fluid every week or two. When its low, I can feel and hear a light buzzing through the steering wheel.

-Jesda

Light buzzing is the pump cavitating, the air bubbles collapse under pressure then reconstitute -explosively wreaking havok with micro- explosions inside your pump. This creates erosion and therefore little pieces of pump throughout the system. Destroying the power steering universe which is so beautifully balanced.AAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHH !!!! RUN AWAY !!!

[Jesda]

OH CRAP! http://jesda.spilky.com/getout.gif

[Chad91Q45]

ha!

[squeefoo]

Chad Are you still going to fix the hose? Speaking of explosions there will be so much smoke when it blows that I gotta see it. Can you get vid of that and post it ?????