Completely Lost Steering!!! Please check your car!
Ahhh!!!! Not a great feeling. I had just pulled into a parking lot and was turning left to make my way into an aisle when the steering wheel completely free-wheeled. It was like spinning a bicycle wheel while off the ground. Thank God I was only going about 5 MPH and was able to come to a complete stop without hitting anything or anyone. It took me about 20 frantic minutes to tear into the lower half of the dash, remove the steering wheel and look under the car for anything obvious. It turned out to be the rag joint (at least that's what I remember it being called on American cars) that connects to a splined shaft connected to the steering wheel. When properly installed, the rag joint slides over the splined shaft and a bolt gets inserted cross way through the joint and passes through a groove in the shaft. When tightened, it prevents the joint and the shaft from separating. If the bolt is missing, your steering wheel can completely disconnect from the rest of the car. I found no loose bolt, so I can only assume I've been driving it with no bolt at all for just over a year. I don't even want to imagine what could have happened considering I have a wife and two very lovely young children.
Anyway, as my luck would have it, I was pulling into the parking lot of a hardware store. I was able to buy a few tools and a bolt to secure the joint and was back up and running in a couple of hours.
I just wanted to get this out there so all of you can look under your dash and make damn sure that bolt is in there.
If this link works, it would be the bolt (not shown) that goes through part number 3.
http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...47&hg=32&fg=30
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