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Power steering

1K views 3 replies 2 participants last post by  canderson 
#1 ·
So, I experienced a brief loss of power steering yesterday that was rather startling, then today I hear about a recall on other models for the exact issue. Anyone else with a Santa Fe experienced this?
 
#2 ·
Loss of power steering, or loss of engine power (feels about the same!)? Only certain years of the Elantra are involved with the recent power steering recall, and it's a VERY different system than that used on any of the Santa Fe years.

You do not tell us what year, only that it's a Limited.
 
#4 ·
The 2009 is not one of the newer units with the drive-by-wire motor drive power steering 'assist', it's a pretty vanilla pump/rack system. If you had brief belt slippage, I could readily understand the loss of power assist, though that ought to have been accompanied by a squeal of belt noise at a minimum. The fact that you do not report hearing anything unusual in the way of squeals (belt) or groans (pump) when this occurs is unfortunate. Even something as ugly as an A/C compressor binding up (in defrost, it cycles to avoid window fogging) or crapped out alternator bearings that are stalling the serpentine belt briefly would be an easier thing to solve than what may be in your future. Sure you don't want to report some noise? Please?

Just so we don't go off totally into the weeds ....

There's a lack of power assist, and there's binding of the system (very often in the rack itself). I don't know if you have the experience to distinguish between them, or whether the circumstances when this occurred would be able make it possible to tell which you encountered. Which it actually was is something you'd know by feel. A binding rack tends to have a particular point or points that offer(s) great resistance to the application of force to the steering wheel. A lack of assist is where there is a smooth and uniform amount of force required to steer, but it feels like you're trying to steer a large truck in setting cement!

We'll work with the 'lack of assist' for now, based upon your initial description, but I have to tell you that we've seen some rack issues but no pump issues on an '09, and your problem rings no bells at all here. Perhaps sbr711 has run into it and will pipe up with his experience.

A lack of assist is an indication of lack of proper fluid flow somewhere in the system. Any by somewhere, I mean anywhere. From a failure of the pump to create pressure, to a blockage in the rack that resists that pressure. Flow issues anywhere in the system (and there are also valves involved here -- e.g., the flow control valve in the pump, and valve body on the rack), must be identified.

The problem in attempting to diagnose this here is that, depending upon the nature of your problem, you could wind up with a very unsafe situation. What you do not want is a steering system that locks up on you, or suddenly becomes very balky just at the time you are trying to make an emergency maneuver. This is one that I would definitely leave in the hands of a competent shop, and wouldn't waste a lot of time getting there.
 
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