Thread: Discovery 4 Power Steering Issues

Call in at 54 Albatross St Winnellie (Darwin Land Rover) and ask Leigh for his thoughts. He's there from 7.30am til after 5. Phone is 8948 3252.

Originally Posted by Narangga

Call in at 54 Albatross St Winnellie (Darwin Land Rover) and ask Leigh for his thoughts. He's there from 7.30am til after 5. Phone is 8948 3252.

I use Leigh on anything that I can’t tackle myself, but he’s become so busy these days - I don’t like to interrupt him unless I have a booking!

I managed to spot the belt slipping on the PS pump pulley so I called Darwin LR today to order a new belt plus tensioner and Leigh actually answered the phone. He has me sorted with overnight air freight.

Now to fit them.. I haven’t taken the fan off before. Any special tools required?

Originally Posted by TopEndThom

I use Leigh on anything that I can’t tackle myself, but he’s become so busy these days - I don’t like to interrupt him unless I have a booking!

I managed to spot the belt slipping on the PS pump pulley so I called Darwin LR today to order a new belt plus tensioner and Leigh actually answered the phone. He has me sorted with overnight air freight.

Now to fit them.. I haven’t taken the fan off before. Any special tools required?

Firstly it is reverse thread so don’t forget that.

A big adjustable spanner on the fan nut and some mental gymnastics on how to stop the drive hub from spinning. Use those small bolt heads to resist against and give it a jolt with the big spanner is all it normally takes.

I did clean my engine bay and lower engine with some CT18 and it made the PS belt slip a while until it regained its grip.

I use the age old technique of a cold chisel and a heavy mallet. Place the cold chisel on the edge of the nut and give it a sharp whack. Comes loose every time. It does mark the fan nut though so if you’re anal about such things, use the special tool.

I don't take the fan off to change the belt, it's big enough and thin enough to get around it

Fluid in the resevoir doesnt tell you what its like at the pump, whilst there for thr new belt, flush it out and fill with new fluid. Check for any leaks at the steering arms, your sand adventure may have torn a boot and its gotten a fill of sandy mud.

Replacing the power steering fluid, and flushing the system regularly is another thing that seems to get missed.

Its pretty easy to do, with a helper.

Thanks everyone for the advice, after a few swings and round-abouts the D4 power steering is back to 100%.
After receiving the belt and tensioner from Leigh at LRNT I went to fit it (removing the fan with the use of Narangga's special spanners - thanks mate! ) but whilst removing the new belt from the bag I realised it was an 8PK belt. Then looking at the new tensioner, its got an 8PK pulley on it.. then looking at my engine realising its a 6PK setup so I had the wrong parts. I'm not sure if its just that all 2.7ltr Discos are 6PK, or that its because mine has a Ford Territory replacement engine.. can anyone shed light on this?
Anyway, upon assessing the rebound on the current tensioner compared to the new one I realised the current one is as good as new, and the belt was actually in pretty good condition. So my suspicions turned to the pump itself. I put everything back together and went down to return the incorrect parts. Leigh took a quick look for me and diagnosed that it's most likely the pump and would need replacing. He smelled the fluid and said it was pretty burnt . So it was booked in for a pump replacement but had to wait 2 weeks. I thought i'd better try buy myself some time as I needed the car so I went home and removed as much fluid as I could with a turkey baster, topping up, then circulating and repeating. I put the fluid I removed into a jar and it was BLACK. After it settled I could see a significant amount of metal in the bottom! Not a pretty sight. The new fluid got me through and a new pump was fitted this morning.

Leigh was kind enough to let me source my own pump as the LR quote was $1100, and the Hitachi $800. That just doesn't fit the current budget. I did some sleuthing and came up with a BGA branded pump out of the UK. $325 delivered with DHL express. Time will tell on the quality!

The rack was flushed out as best as possible as the metal shavings are a serious concern and will most likely result in terminal illness. Leigh suggested fitting a return line filter to save the new pump from any debris which sounded like a great idea.. but the more I think about it the more I query it.. doesn't the return line run straight to the reservoir, then the fluid is filtered through the bottom strainer straight back to the pump?
Would love your collective thoughts on that.

Thanks again all who offered help

Thom

P.S I couldn't for the life of me find a brand new (affordable) pump with the 6PK pulley on it. So I bought the 8PK version. The 6PK belt just runs on the first 6 grooves, leaving 2 spare