We've had terrible problems identifying the cause of a sporadic cut out of pwer steering on my 2002 Mini Cooper. Eventually we replaced the power steering unit, but this did little to improve things. The battery gave up 2 weeks later and after replacing this the problem hasn't occured again. Could the state of the battery have had a direct impact on the steering unit performance?
Any advice from personal experince would be helpful, esp as MINI dealer couldn't trace the problem following 3 visits!
My Car was standing for a few days, and when i went to dirve it again, the battery light showed up.. i called my mechanic down and he had noticed that there was no power steering.. what does this mean... that i need to buy a new power steering pump or what? we tried to jump start the car, to see if the power sterring would work , and it didnt.. this makes me thik maybe the pump has burnt out? Need all the help i can get pleasee!! x thanks
It could be but believe it or not the MINI can't run all the functions it has on just the alternator. The grounding strap on my MINI snapped (it was modified) on a trip. I lost NAV, Radio, PS, and my instrument cluster. The battery handles a great deal of stress that the alternator can't deal with.
That being said, it is something I would check to see if it is putting out the proper voltage.
Thanks you all so much.. youve been a great help.. im going to check the voltage on the battery in the morning and go from there.. 13v when idiling right? im hopeing its not the psp.. very expensive i see. x thanks again x
I replaced a brand new alternator, and then realised that my psp had actually burnt out.. replaced it with a second hand one, replaced it all my self etc. switched the car on.. no battery light on but the power steering still not working checked all the fuses, all okay.. but still NO POWER STEERING! why does this happen to me?
My pump is beyond repair... and yeah the power steering pump was checked and tried.. im gunna check to see if there is power? thanks so much for ll your help MAB01uk x
okay well this just gets better im sure.. i took it down to the garage to get them to check the power connectors.. the main wires were giving off power.. from the batter but the three littles wires, only 2 worked, then only one.. when we looked at the dash, all of the major lights were showing up i.e batter light, abs, airbag, warning light etc. Then all of a sudden the car just cut out, and wouldnt start again... jump started it, got it home and thats where it can sit now. whats is going on with these mini's?
Your PS pump controller may be shot (part of the pump) and drained your battery, you need to put a code reader on the car that can interrogate the PS pump to check for faults. I would disconnect your battery until you can get a code reader on it. Also check the main power lead from the pump to check it has rubbed the insulation off and caused the battery to drain. There is a 100amp fuse on the underside of the fuse box under the bonnet, stick a multi meter on it to check if its blown.
The PS Pump has 4 error codes you can access via the OBD port. Your code reader needs to be able to read Mini specific codes like the iCarsoft i910.
I had a similar problem where my new battery drained whilst parked on my driveway after I had been using the car that day .The first sign I had problems was my car alarm going off , when I went out to check my car I found that the power steering fan was staying on all the time which was draining the battery ....charged the battery overnight took my car for a spin the following day and my power steering quit literally as soon as I returned home .
I contacted my main dealer as the power steering pump failing is a known issue with first gen mini's and they asked me to take the car to them so they could run a diagnostic check and if it was the PSP they would contact mini and get their ok to replace it at no cost to me apart from the cost of the diag test and the replacement power steering fluid ( Main dealer was Lloyds Mini in Blackpool and this was back in Jan/Feb of this year ) .
My advice would be to contact your local main dealer as your first port of call and see what they have to say , I understand from reading around that some main dealers can be awkward ( mine were fantastic) when it comes to this however it can pay to stick to your guns and mention this site .
Hope this is helpful
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