Loose feel on front wheels and slight noise on full lock

[defever]

Hello forum users,

I'm starting to notice something with my steering lately. When I drive over even a slightest bump, a surface crack on the road, drain / manhole cover, my front wheel sways noticeably. I drove 500miles last weekend, and it was more recognisable and had to counter steer every time. The drive feels "slippery". It's fine driving straight, doesn't drift to one side, only when the car takes a bump that the front wheels decide to dance.

It almost feels like riding a bike with deflated tyres. That slippery feeling. I checked the tyres and they are not punctured or leaking... hmm..

I also noticed that on full lock, both left and right full lock, I hear a high pitch noise coming from under the bonnet. I think it's the power steering pump, but I'm not sure. The noise isn't rubbery squeal like a fan belt, or a rattle, just a high pitch "unwinding" noise. I'm struggling to find the right word to describe... This has been the same since I owned it 3 months ago but the slippery drive is becoming gradually noticeable.

It's done 135,000miles and I need to check when the ball joints (all eight) have been replaced.

I'm not sure the two are connected but this is something to look into isn't it?

Any similar story or advice / suggestion / solution from fellow drivers will be helpful, thank you everyone.

[dreddfan]

I had an awful screech on full lock until last week.
I thought the Power Steering pump was on the way out but a new fan belt cured it. It's a cheap fix and worth a try ( and it can be done without removing the front of the car as well without much effort.)
Also, I had the same 'slippery' feeling and found my CV joint was going on the passenger side. That'd be my first port of call with any knocking in the steering at full lock.
Hope this helps.

[defever]

Thanks dreddfan,

I think so too. Just checked previous work; all upper and lower suspension arms were replaced in the last 2 years (done 20,000miles since the first 4 arms replaced). Had a full service 3,000miles ago and there was no advisory indicating anything about CV joints or suspension arms. But I can't find any work done on CV in the last 5 years of history so I guess that's what's going wrong.

And thanks for the fan belt advise, I have "light cracking on both auxiliary drive belts" as one of the advisories from the last full service so I'm slightly convinced that's what's happening.

If I run a vag-com scan, will some sort of warning or error show up for CV and fan belt?

[dreddfan]

Sorry for not getting back to this sooner.
I don't think vag-com will show up any codes for belt/cv problems but there are people here who can give you a definite answer on that.

[dreddfan]

Another thing you could check for is wear in your track rod ends, just found a worn one on my wagon (along with a worn rear wheel bearing )

[defever]

Little update on this:
One of the fan belts (the power steering one) failed whilst driving! Got the car recovered and fixed. Got the other fan belt (air con) replaced as well. Not much change on the situation (screeching on full lock and slippery drive).

Took my car to a local garage I trust and asked them to have a look. They took it for a drive and recognised the "slippery feel", but couldn't pin point anything faulty on the steering, front wheel tracking, or CV joints. But they said the rear suspensions (both sides) are going (the rubber gaiters are torn to bits). They didn't link the rear suspension with the slippery feel, but after hearing that I'm sort of noticing the slip coming from the back end of the car (placebo effect?).

When I go round the bend, the car drifts towards the centre line of the road and when I come out of the bend that's when I regain my grip and the car sways due to the sudden increase in grip and remaining centripetal force still acting on the car.

Booked in for suspension replacement next week so lets see if that makes any different to the drive...

[dreddfan]

Hope this sorts it lad.

[acmo]

I had a similar problem with my avant, upon grabbing the wheel and trying to turn it by hand there was a lot of play. The track rod ends are bonded in a rubber damper which fail. Nice idea but not a nice drive when they come unstuck!

[spartacus 68]

Renew suspension link on front and ARB rubber bushes. Both are quick and easy and inexpensive repairs.

Worn suspension components will identify on tyre surface, no scrubbing on inside of tyre, etc.

[defever]

Update after the rear suspensions replacement:

Perhaps it's a placebo effect if I say "a lot", but the drive feels definitely better! I only drove few miles from the garage to home last evening, but so much more stable around the bend. In comparison, the car felt like an unloaded shopping trolley going around the isle (no grip and super drift from the back two fixed wheels), but now it's like a super grippy go-cart.

Now that I can notice the difference, I am more convinced that it was the back wheels causing the "slippery" drive. As I described on my last post, the car slides towards the centre line around the bend and I had to, in effect, react with the steering to prevent over-steering (not as drastic as it sounds, though). So the reaction of the steering made me think that it was the front wheels being loose and not being as responsive as I expected, but in fact it was the rear wheels sliding due to poor shock absorption. Is this a good understanding of what could have been happening?

Cost nearly £600 (along with small labour tasks like door drop fix and airbag light on the dashboard, just a build up of muck on the pre-tensioner) but I'm happy with this. Perhaps I could've shopped around for a cheaper solution but I'm against time and it was something I didn't want to be done half-measure. Haven't checked the screeching noise on full wheel lock, but I was more concerned about the slippery drive so all in all I'm relieved.

Thanks all for your comments, this one was an odd question but I think I've learnt from it and I hope this can be some use to other forum users.