Hi all,

My 2.5TD just failed its MOT on a split nearside gaiter on the steering rack. I got a pair of new Quinten Hazell ones and set about fitting them. I found the self-help file here:
http://club-xm.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=4714
But blue94auto had the engine out when he replaced the gaiter. Unfortunately, I don't have that luxury. My problem starts when I've got to undo the two 10mm bolts which hold the pinion drive onto the rack body. First of all they are cap screws as opposed to bolts and secondly, there's no way to get to them with the engine in place. Also, how do you get the ram unhooked from the bracket at the track rod end of the rack at the nearside? There's not much room for the ram to come off the end of the threaded stud. I've removed the two torx bolts holding the other end of the ram but it doesn't improve the flexibility by much.

I'm sure I read somewhere about dropping the front chassis to make enough room to either remove the rack completely or remove the pinion block.

Does anyone have any experience of this? Does the chassis need to be dropped? How do you do it? There are two bolted staqys, one in either wheel arch linking the chassis to the upper part of the monocoque shell. Do these have to come off too? If I remove the visible fixing bolts for the chassis I can't quite see how its supposed to hinge at the front and fall down at the back.

Any and all help much appreciated.

cheers

noz

Hi Noz

Not done a rack on a live car but I think Dean has done his twice.
Replacement failed. Will see if I can get him to log on here.
Have a nearly complete 2.5 front subframe loose in the unit at the moment.
About to strip it ready to clean up and weld repair as a spare (now had 3 MOT fails on this). So if you need anything checked let me know.
Unlike the rubber mounted rear subframe the front one needs every vertical bolt loosened for it to drop. Fixed links just need the bottom bolts removed.
The vertical bolts are fairly long so you can easily lower by about 50mm.

John

Thanks John, too late tonight. I'll give it a go in the morning.
Cheers
noz

Hi Noz

I have never had the pleasure of having to do just the N/S Gaiter myself whilst on the car but as John says i have had 2 or 3 rack replacements and am in the middle of a rebuild now (dont ask).
From what ive found the rack has to be unbolted from the subframe and turned or if you have the room moved forwards to get the ram off, then of course the pinion and supply pipes have to come off along with the o/s track rod and the rack tensioner needs to be undone to be able to slide the rack itself out of the casing...................so what im getting at is why not go the extra mile, bend the o/s handbrake cable guide a little and take the rack out. It is miles easier to do on the bench in an Nasp engined car at least, on the turbo i iether had to take the downpipe off the turbo to give the rack room to turn forward 90 degrees for extraction or take the ram off first BUT with the 2.5 engine bay one of the best packed of the range im a little uncertain of the finer details.
I have a rack on the bench though if you need pictures or anything like that.

Also ive found only OE gaiters work on the rack, rubber ones do not locate on the housing properly and just fall off after two minutes even if clips are used, also if they are too thick the rack cannot turn fully lock to lock and stops on the squashed gaiter and not where it should.

GOOD LUCK!!

D

Hi Noz

Just got back from the workshop.
Front pair of bolts are shorter than I though but are good for a 25mm drop.
Rear ones were already out so could not find them with vertainty to check.
I have seen a front subframe dropped on a lift.
Front on bolts and rear on a jack stand.
Had to be dropped to change the sump on a 2.5 would you believe.

John

John/Dedan,

Well the job's done now but I don't want to do that again. It was a right pig. I dropped the chassis but the bolts weren't long enough to leave them in place so I took them out all together. The chassis dropped by 50mm or so. I tried for an hour to split the rubber union on the steering wheel shaft but gave in when I had a brainwave. I had removed the offside track rod by undoing the union with the rack. I left the nearside attached because it was still attached in Gary's photo in the link above. However, I thought, why not remove the nearside as well? It came off as easy as the offside leaving the aluminium casting attached which connects to the ram. I tried undoing the casting and then tried pullers to pull it off, all in vain. Then my dad had the bright idea of simply slipping the gaiter over the casting. After a bit of greasing it was surprisingly easy.

Dean, you are right about the gaiters. Although there's a groove in the casting on both the rack ends and the inside end of the aluminium casting, the Q&H gaiters are smooth on the inside. There's no step to locate in the groove. So, the gaiters slide off when you extend the rack. I used the nylon cable ties for the two rack ends but ended up using a jubilee clip for the casting end. Its the only way I could get them to stay on.

With the gaiters on I set about reassembling all the parts I'd taken off. Getting the bolts back into the back side of the ram was a nightmare. The springiness of the pipes kept the hole in the ram off-centre compared to the hole in the rack. It took me ages to get them to align. After a lot of expletives I finally got everything reassembled.

The really bad news is that the rack is leaking fluid where the drive from the steering wheel enters the housing for the pinion. Even if I wing it through the MOT tomorrow it will have to come off, this time properly. I am not looking forward to that. Does anyone know the arrangement at the top of the pinion housing under the plastic dust cap? Why should it leak from there? Is there a seal under the dust cap?

When adjusting the sliding plunger which pushes on the rack at the location of the pinion does anyone know how much to tighten the big hollow hex plug? The type I'm used to had shims. To increase the psprig pressure a shim was removed and it was retightened until the threaded plug bottomed out against a shoulder. In the XM's case there is no shoulder or shims. It looks like you just have to tighten it until the desired spring pressure is reached. Question is, how do you know when its enough?

Cheers

noz

Yes Noz

Theres an O ring or two were the pinion comes up to join to the lower UJ joint..

These have obviously worn, or if I read what you wrote correctly you didn't remove the UJ while dismantleing the rack on the N/s? This could VERY well have damged the O ring in the pinion shaft..

Ive always had engines out when Ive looked at Racks, but Id also would have sugested removeing the bottom engine mount on the subframe, and dropping the subframe away as much as possible - however, this is not too easy on a 2.5 as the top mount doesnt "Hook" onto a mount like the 2.1 and 2 litre TCT, so the 2,5 wont hang in place while the subframe is dropped...

Paul

Hi all,

Well, after tea tonight, I set about removing the rack. Since I'd done about 3/4 of the job at the weekend to replace the gaiters I was well armed. I had the chassis dropped in about 10 minutes and the rack out in another 45 min. The hardest thing about it was undoing the two banjo unions where the pipes connect and separating the heat shield from the rack. Once freed it came out the off-side wheel arch. I undid the handbrake cable to move it out of the way. It wasn't too bad after all. It looked a lot worse than it was.

I ordered a seal kit and both gaiters from Citroen today. When I took it for the retest and swung the steering from one lock to another both gaiters came off the inside. I didn't want to reassemble all that only to find they came off again. The parts are due to arrive by 09.30 tomorrow morning.

One thing that is a slight wory is the rubber union on the steering wheel shaft. I thought about splitting it here to begin with but the head of the bolts just turned inside the rubber when I tried to undo the nuts. That means that the rubber is beginning to delaminate. I hope it hangs together long enough for the rest of the cars life. I eventually split the shaft at the spline where the single bolt goes right through. I hope I can figure out how to align the steering wheel again.

Assuming the seal kit is easy to fit I should have the rack back in tomorrow evening.

Thanks for all the suggestions.

cheers

noz

Noz

Why undo the banjo's and go upsetting the Copper seals if there is any.. if you follow the pipes down the rack you'll find the proper union connections at the opposite end, you can then take the pipes out with the rack, and if uncoated like most are clean them up...

Good work though.. its worth the Subframe lowering..

Rgds
Paul

Hi Paul,

I didn't see any unions at the opposite end. The two pipes are continuous. The supply works its way around the lower flange of the chassis from the front of the car where it jumps from the chassis to the engine in a flex. There's a union on a bracket with two pipes at the front nearside corner of the chassis. On the return side the pipe leaves the rack and heads up towards the reservoir. About half way up it changes from steel pipe to rubber pipe and then connects to one of the spigots on top of the reservoir. the steel pipes are plastic coated and are in very good condition.

Where did you say the unions should be?

The banjos have o-rings rather than copper washers. I managed to salvage them. But the banjo bolts were very, very tight.

cheers
noz

Well, the deed is done.

The kit was not straightforward to fit. The control box with the 4 pipes going into it attached to the rack had to be dismantled a fair way to intall the new seals. I had to replace them because it was leaking past the shaft out of the top of the box. Whilst the box comes apart very easily, the bearing obscures your view of the shaft just at the point where you have to help the new seals past the chamfer as you reinsert the shaft into the box. The bearing and lip seal need to be removed from the shaft and added only once the shaft and its new seals are installed. The bearing is an interference fit on the shaft and needs a puller to remove it.

The OEM gaiters were perfect. Unlike the Quinten & Hazell counterparts they do have a rim around the inside which locates in the groove on the rack whereas the Q&H gaiters were smooth on the inside. In addition, the OEM gaiters were made of thinner stuff which stretched and compressed with no effort when the steering was turned form one extreme to the other.

I took photos of the rebuild which I'll compile into a self-help file when I get a chance.

The hardest element of refitting the rack was to line up the splines on the universal joint between the steering wheel shaft and the rack. I tried several times before I got the wheels pointing forward at the same time as the steering wheel centred. The remainder of the job was fairly straightforward although longer becuse I was doing it myself in the pouring rain last night.

Its booked in for a re-test at another garage tomorrow at 10.00am. Fingers crossed. Hopefully we'll get away with the caravan on Saturday as planned.

Thanks for all the help and advice.

cheers

noz

Sobering reading. Well done.