[Sean]

it was going to happen to me. My 330Ci retrofit steering rack has failed. Yup, less than one year and less than 3,000 miles and the POS is making noise and it's leaking.
If it isn't broken, don't' fix it. I guess that goes both ways, BMW AG for ever missing with the steering in the first place (making it lighter in 2001) and for me actually going through with having the retrofit performed. I knew something like this was bound to happen.

 

[ALEX325i]

it was going to happen to me. My 330Ci retrofit steering rack has failed. Yup, less than one year and less than 3,000 miles and the POS is making noise and it's leaking.
If isn't broken, don't' fix it. I guess that goes both ways, BMW AG for ever missing with the steering in the first place (making it lighter in 2001) and for me actually going through with having the retrofit performed. I knew something like this was bound to happen.

Sorry to hear that...

Yup. Now that I'm used to my 325i's steering, I'm kinda' glad that BMW did NOT follow up on their promise to hook me up...

 

[Sean]

Looks like that was a very wise decision. I believe Alan F. made the same choice. As you can tell I'm very displeased about this. We would have never known that the rack was leaking if the Tech had not removed the plastic panel to listen to the noise that the steering rack started making yesterday. Damn remanufactured steering racks. :thumbdwn:

 

[geomax]

Looks like that was a very wise decision. I believe Alan F. made the same choice. As you can tell I'm very displeased about this. We would have never known that the rack was leaking if the Tech had not removed the plastic panel to listen to the noise that the steering rack started making yesterday. Damn remanufactured steering racks. :thumbdwn:

Damn, that bites that it failed. What are they going to do to correct the problem? Replace it again?

 

[johnlew]

While my steering I'm sure qualified for the light steering, it tracked so true and responded so quickly that I decided to not mess with a good thing.

 

[Sean]

Yes, they are, but that maybe be a problem. BMW NA has to authorize the retrofit steering rack (99-00 323/328 rack) and something to do with a core charge because it's a different rack vs. the factory 330 rack that was initially installed. What a mess! :thumbdwn:

 

[alee]

... to listen to the noise that the steering rack started making yesterday

Just curious... what kind of noises was it making?

 

[Sean]

It's hard to describe, maybe like creaking noise. You'd have to heard it.

 

[ayn]

You are the only one with problems with the retrofit steering. I love mine, no problems whatsoever... but I'll definitely check for leaks and pay attention to strange noise from now on, sorry for what happened to you and thanks for sharing the info.

--Andrew

 

[Sean]

This is not necessarily true. There have been others that thought their steering effort did not increase (still light) and there were a few, including myself that had the Brake Induced Vibration (BIV) after the retrofit was done. Keep in mind that the rack is a 99-00 323/328 rack and during that period many of those cars had the BIV, which in order to resolve that issue a new (softer) coupler had to been installed.