[s-cars] Brake booster + steering rack boot

[Peter Golledge]

My time to remove and reinstall the first rack was about 8 hours.  That
included putting in a new pump, flushing out the entire system with
Hyrdraulic fluid, adding a filter (Jorgen requires this).  The second rack
took about 4 hours since everything was ready to roll from the first.  

Removing installing a booster on a 95 S6 is a right PITA probably 4 hours
including lots of lying on back with head in footwell joy.  The "blind nut"
that you need to access is a case of completely demented German engineering
design.  No idea if this is the same on the earlier S though.  If you have
leak down after shutdown I believe your accumulator (pretty easy to replace)
is more likely the culprit.  Check out Fred Munro's excellent article on
determining "root cause", a google search should turn that up.

I utilized a used booster from Force5 with no issues thus far. 

-----Original Message-----
From: Wayne Dohnal [mailto:wd43 at hevanet.com] 
Sent: Thursday, June 17, 2010 3:51 AM
To: S-car list
Subject: Re: [s-cars] Brake booster + steering rack boot

Thanks to the list for the suggestions about the brake booster and rack. 
At this point I'm a bit scared of installing a used brake booster.  How long

would it last?  Or maybe it's even worse than the one I have in there now. 
It feels to me risky like installing a used water pump, as opposed to 
something like a taillight or fender.  I put a meter on the pressure switch 
and it doesn't trigger for over 15 minutes after stopping the car.  So I'm 
not at the point of immediate brake boost loss, at least not yet.

Peter - sounds like you installed the new rack yourself.  Could you possibly

compare the time and difficulty to a timing belt job?  Larry - How much did 
it cost to have your rack installed professionally?

I 'm also considering just letting things continue to deterioriate and 
eventually walking away from the car.  I love it, but don't want to let it 
consume too much of my life, time or money-wise.  Tough decision because it 
is so darn comfortable and runs great.

Wayne Dohnal
1994 S4