Power Steering Failure - Help

M

Mr.Tea

New member
As title suggests, i'm pretty sure my power steering has just gone and died on me or atleast, is on its way.

Context; I backed off the drive this morning and when I went to turn the wheel I found it very heavy as in i'm struggling to pull it levels of heavy. I pulled back onto the drive and parked the car. With the engine running I gave the wheel the slightest pull and heard a loud whining/whirring noise and the wheel flicked back into the center position. Tried this in the opposite direction with the same result.

I assumed i'd lost my power steering fluid only to learn that all Jags from 2016 onwards (as far as I can tell) use electronic power steering. I can't find anything in the owners handbook about this and being Sunday, zero garages I can get the car recovered to.

Is there anything dumb like a low battery that could cause the issue or some kind of sensor that might've failed? How much is a potential new power steering going to set me back?

Car is a 2016 V6 F-Type. Car started up perfectly fine and didn't notice any issues until I went to turn. No messages or warnings on dash about the power steering.

Any and all info appreciated.
 
Low battery voltage has been known to cause some random gremlins. Have you checked the voltage?
 
scm said:
Low battery voltage has been known to cause some random gremlins. Have you checked the voltage?
Click to expand...

I have not, no and i'm not sure i've got a multimeter sitting around unless there's another way to test it than using a multimeter across the terminals of the battery? Does the car have some form of hidden menus in it's own system that can read the voltage?
 
Under the OSF wheelarch is a black plastic housing which is a joint for the power steering connectors. Being located where it is means it’s susceptible to corrosion from moisture and road grime. It may be worth having a looksy and cleaning those terminals up in case they’re causing a high resistance/poor connection. Also check the fuse in case it’s blown although I can’t remember which one it is…
 
Small update; grabbed my brothers multimeter. Battery is at 12.16v which, as far as i'm aware, is okay.

Kev said:
Under the OSF wheelarch is a black plastic housing which is a joint for the power steering connectors. Being located where it is means it’s susceptible to corrosion from moisture and road grime. It may be worth having a looksy and cleaning those terminals up in case they’re causing a high resistance/poor connection. Also check the fuse in case it’s blown although I can’t remember which one it is…
Click to expand...

Will check that in the morning when it gets light. As per the fuse, I had a look through the owners handbook earlier today to check this exact thing but couldn't see anything listed for the power steering. I assumed because I can hear the motor whirring/whining when I try to turn the wheel, it must be 'working' but stuck or bound somehow?

I've looked online for different fuse box diagrams and none of them, for the F-type, show any fuse for any EPAS, power steering or any name for it. The diagrams for other models of Jaguars definitely do!
 
A charge of 12.16v in a resting battery is only around 55% charge, so it’s far below where it should be.
I d want that charging overnight and retesting and if not back to c12.6v -12.7v be looking for a new battery, before looking deeper at the steering problem..
 
cj10jeeper said:
A charge of 12.16v in a resting battery is only around 55% charge, so it’s far below where it should be.
I d want that charging overnight and retesting and if not back to c12.6v -12.7v be looking for a new battery, before looking deeper at the steering problem..
Click to expand...

Could I try simply running the car and letting the alternator charge the battery or is it possibly to the point where the battery cannot charge that much? I might be able to get my hands on a trickle charger and let it run over the course of tomorrow daytime. I don't want to leave anything running to the car overnight as it sits on the drive.

F-types use AGM batteries, correct? I'd assume this would be the one I need?
 
It would take a drive of an hour or so to fully charge the battery, which may not work with your steering issues. Much better to put it on a charger for a good few hours. I use a CTEK mx5 as do a good few others on here.
Yes, mostly on AGM. Put your reg into Halfords for a proper match.
 
cj10jeeper said:
It would take a drive of an hour or so to fully charge the battery, which may not work with your steering issues. Much better to put it on a charger for a good few hours. I use a CTEK mx5 as do a good few others on here.
Yes, mostly on AGM. Put your reg into Halfords for a proper match.
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My brother has a trickle charger (not anything fancy) that he used on one of his cars, i'll use that tomorrow and see how it goes. If that fails to charge sufficiently, i'll scramble to halfords and pick up the battery I linked earlier. In the 3 years i've owned the car, I've never had any battery/electronic related issues and never had to use a trickle charger on it. While I hope (and pray) it does fix the issue, I find it strange that it's just started happening out of nowhere but cars do be like that sometimes.
 
Mr.Tea said:
cj10jeeper said:
It would take a drive of an hour or so to fully charge the battery, which may not work with your steering issues. Much better to put it on a charger for a good few hours. I use a CTEK mx5 as do a good few others on here.
Yes, mostly on AGM. Put your reg into Halfords for a proper match.
Click to expand...

My brother has a trickle charger (not anything fancy) that he used on one of his cars, i'll use that tomorrow and see how it goes. If that fails to charge sufficiently, i'll scramble to halfords and pick up the battery I linked earlier. In the 3 years i've owned the car, I've never had any battery/electronic related issues and never had to use a trickle charger on it. While I hope (and pray) it does fix the issue, I find it strange that it's just started happening out of nowhere but cars do be like that sometimes.
Click to expand...

Batteries do fail, with some lasting longer than others. A mix of good management and luck.
Check the charger is ok for agm batteries.
I cannot say it will fix the issue, but needs addressing anyway and as posted by others low voltage is troublesome to F Types.
 
It's recommended to fully charge a new battery anyway since they often lose charge sitting on the shelf.
 
cj10jeeper said:
It would take a drive of an hour or so to fully charge the battery, which may not work with your steering issues.
Click to expand...

Unfortunately if the charger doesn't support AGM batteries, I might have to sit with the car running with a few revs on it and see if the battery charges that way.

When the engine is running, what voltage should I be looking for at it's 'charged' state?
 
It doesn’t work that way. With the engine running it’ll just show the alternator output at around 14.7v
You’d need to run the engine for ages then switch off and let the battery rest, then test the voltage
 
cj10jeeper said:
It doesn’t work that way. With the engine running it’ll just show the alternator output at around 14.7v
You’d need to run the engine for ages then switch off and let the battery rest, then test the voltage
Click to expand...

Understood. Thanks for the advice.
 
It was late last night so only a quick response.
This image may help clarify that whilst 12.1v might seem ok, a fully charged battery should be just over 12.6v (6 cells @2.1v = 12.6v) 12.7 is the typical readuing

batt2chg.jpg

Personally I'd connect the trickle charger anyway as the battery looks to be flat/dead as seems you plan to buy a new one. If you've done lots of startups to try to play with the power steering, left the doors open, etc. then it may be a good battery, just in need of a charge. I'm just reluctant to drop £250 on a battery without at least testing the current one.

The reason I said running the engine doesn't work well is it takes so long. At least an hour in the garage or 30 minutes at motorway speed and frankly that just to add some power to the battery, not to bring it back to full state.
A CTEC for example can take 12-24 hours to fully charge a battery though the phases.

God luck in getting a battery in a decent state before then moving to seeing what's up with the power steering
 
Thanks for the further information. I've left the car on trickle charge throughout the day and tested again. Battery was reading 12.53v. Car started perfectly fine, can reverse and accelerate fine, steering is as previously described. Had a quick chat with my local indy today (while the car was charging) and their first port of call was to charge the battery. Waiting on a call back to see if I can get it recovered to them tomorrow.

Not ideal.

Update: Indy has agreed to take the car despite being extremely busy meaning they'll only get to look at it between other jobs. Lucky I have a week off work ahead! Hopefully it's a simple/quick job for them and i'm praying it's not ludicrously expensive repair.
 
Thanks Kev. Last week before the problem arose, where I live, we had horrendous downpours and I had to drive through standing water on the roads however nothing excessive, the power steering failed three days later. Is it likely i'd be able to claim this on my insurance if it's proven as water ingress though it really shouldn't be. I should be able to prove this via footage off my dash cam as well.

I was careful about driving through the standing water it never even crossed my mind that it might have been a potential cause as the unit should be sealed & protected against water. I know the F-Pace models had loads of failures on a similar issue.
 
Update: Independant rang me today. Basically, the steering rack is shagged. Doesn't appear to be water ingress but wear & tear and it's rusted up and seized. The bolts holding the motor have sheared. Guy said that they might be able to get a used one but they're rare to come by but new ones are available in an instant. I've told them to just get a new one installed as it should last the lifetime of the car and come with some kind of one or two year warranty on the part and I believe their work has a 6 month guarantee.

All in, it's just shy of £3,200. Not sure if a warranty would have even helped me here. Would this be excluded and seen as wear and tear?
 
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