Oil leak near front driver side wheel

[J Wikoff]

I got under and verified that it is coming from under the boot. It's a drip every couple of seconds while it's running.

Does a new rack come with any of these lines attached to it? The corrosion resistance of these is atrocious.

[BuildItYourSelf]

I think it comes with two of the lines.

[J Wikoff]

Job done. For the most part it went OK. Until the very end. I'll get to that. Most thing came apart as expected, but I did smoke one 3/8 ratchet on a stubborn rack mount bolt. I did have to remove the line with the bracket and unbolt the driver radius arm from the spindle to get it out, but that wasn't too much hassle. I got everything buttoned up, fluid filled, cycling wheel back and forth and i get a releasing pressure sound. I shut it down and find a huge red puddle under the car. The washer(s) on the banjo bolt for the return line on the passenger side gave out. I tried some spares but none worked. So i got the heftiest oil drain plug gaskets i could find at Advance and they seem to be working.

[J Wikoff]

I thought I should share my experience with trying to get the tie rods on the new rack to match the old ones.

I measured everything carefully and got them to match as best I could, from rod end to rod end, and relative to a fixed point on the rack with the steering shaft in the same position. I must have had the shaft shifted just a little bit because my steering wheel ended up about 30 degrees off to the right. It seemed like I had the shaft lined up the same, but, whatever. I took it for a test drive. It didn't pull much at all, so that was good. But, there's a hill near my house with a decently sharp left hand turn immediately at the bottom. When I got to the bottom and turned left, it just so happened that I had to point the wheel straight to make the turn. At that point, the stability control decided that I wanted to be going straight, and tried very hard to send me into the trees on the outside of the turn. I managed to keep it mostly on the road, and then turned the ESP off. 1/4 mile later and I got a warning message on the DIC that it was gonna stay off. I went back home and adjusted the tie rods. After a couple adjustments and drives, I had shifted the ends about 5 quarter turns each and now it's pretty good. Straighter than it was before all this, actually.

[BuildItYourSelf]

Still a good idea to get an alignment or mark and measure the front tires. Toe in or out can feel straight and stable.

You can get a rough idea by measuring off a tire groove. But that's not exactly square on the wheel. It's better to mark it.

[J Wikoff]

I need to get a LCA replaced, so it's gonna get aligned soon.