Servotronic/steering issues...

[Kalevera]

Guys -

In the past two days, my car has developed some interesting problems. Most notably:

There is a perceptible moment of looseness in the steering after starting up and moving off. It only happens after the car has been started, and goes away after one or two turns of the wheel. I'd describe it as a few inches of *really loose* travel, wherein it feels like the front tires just hit a patch of ice. I just went out and tried turning the wheel after starting up the car (without putting it in drive), and it occured again. I turned the car off, then restarted and it wasn't there.

I've replaced all front end components (tie rods, center link, idler arm) in the past 800 miles. I'm thinking that it's the power steering pump. The servotronic unit looks good, doesn't appear to have any leaks, and there is little perceptible looseness when trying to shake the universal joints and shafts.

Any ideas?

Best, Whit

[shogun]

As I know it from my E32 wich is in many technical things identical.

Remove the female and male plug from the control module for Servotronic.
Plug them together.
Start engine and now the power steering should be always at full power=steering should be light.
If that is the case from the beginning when starting the car, I would look into the servo control unit.
Quite often it has to be resoldered.
The plugs are yellow, you cannot miss them.
Hre a pic from the inerts of the module:


From around 1995 the module looks different



The control goes according to my limited electr. knowledge as following: When car is not moving there are at the out-termnal of the module 12V and therefore at the in-terminal of the converter 12Volt. By this a kind of vallves is opened to a larger diameter and the thrughput of the hydraulic oil increases = more power steering assist. The higher the speed of the car is, the lower will be the voltage = less power assist.
Don't know how it works in detail, but I measured values between 3-12V.

Maybe someone can explain that a bit better or corrects me.

[Kalevera]

Sweet post, shogun. not sure who rated it, but it was a slick idea. It's funny because, knock on wood, the weirdness disappeared today. It'll probably be back, and I'll test it out.

thanks! whit