Strange steering noise?

[Guest]

Hi guys, wonder if anyone can help me please......? I'm a relatively new 944S2 owner (April this year). The car has completed 105,000 miles now and has an excellent specialist service history, belts changed at 95,000 miles and appears generally to have been well looked after and maintaned. Since buying the car, i have had to replace the rear tyres and the exhausts 'back box', however; after about a month or so of driving i noticed, what can only be described as a whirring noise when taking long bends on motorways at speeds in excess (heavens forbid!) of 70mph. I have had this noise checked out by my local garage who assure me they can find nothing wrong. The noise has continued to get louder and is intermitent, by that i mean sometimes it is always when i steer to the left and sometimes when i steer to the right, but never (or at least not so far anyway) when i steer in both directions i.e i can take 5 left hand turns and it will make a noise but when i turn to the right it won't make any, then later on during the same journey i can take 4 / 5 right hand turns and there will be the noise, but nothing when i steer to the left. It is not a clunking noise, it is a steady whining noise which as i say has become more noticeable over time and now occurs at lower speeds in excess of 50mph. Anyone have any ideas, it is completely baffling me?

Thanks
Dan.

 

[Guest]

Bearings? Cv joints? I think CV usually clicks though...Nothing rubbing is there? Grab the wheel and give it a good shake top to bottom and side to side...feel for any movement. Thats all I can think of?[&:]

 

[Alpine]

could it be the power steering pump (a complete guess on my part, but maybe someone else can confirm?)

 

[NeilW]

My car whined, particularly from cold, when the power steering rack seals were failing. This was allowing PS fluid to escape and air to be sucked into the system. Apparantly this causes cavitation and the resulting noise. I started by renewing the PS fluid, checked all the hoses and bought a new reservoir, which seemed to help initially, but it didn't last. I ended up having to install a recon rack and having the pump re-sealed. Your symptoms do sound a bit different though.

 

[Guest]

Thanks guys, i'm taking it along to the garage this Friday, gulp! I'll let you know the diagnosis.

Dan.

 

[danmason]

As Neil has suggested, PS is not a likely suspect when the problem is only evident above 50mph - at that speed the PS shouldn't be doing much if anything (not sure of the speed at which it's deactivated completely, but it's definitely below 70). On the other hand if it's happening in both directions that would decrease the likelihood of it being a bearing (in my limited experience). It seems you have us flummoxed!

 

[Guest]

Flush powered steering fluid, with cheap stuff then fill with STP ATF cured mine!

 

[944cabby]

Is the exhaust fully secure?When i bought my old 924lux, the exhaust wasn't fully secure so on corners part of it was just touching the underside of the car making a tapping sound.Could be a failing wheel bearing or maybe they just need tightening up.Changing the fluid like rossy states would be a good start - my pump was noisy and a change to ATF fixed it (although you can still hear it groan at very slow speeds now and then) - i didn't think the pump did anything when driving at speed though.