Hi there,

I am new to this webpage so appreciate any advice! I own a Skoda Favba 8V 1.4cc five door hatchback (year 2000). To date its been a great runnner and highly reliable.

Unfortunetely the warning light for the power steering has come on and the steering itself feels very heavy! Has anybody else experienced this?

Many thanks!

Hi there,

I am new to this webpage so appreciate any advice! I own a Skoda Favba 8V 1.4cc five door hatchback (year 2000). To date its been a great runnner and highly reliable.

Unfortunetely the warning light for the power steering has come on and the steering itself feels very heavy! Has anybody else experienced this?

Many thanks!

Its a pretty common problem - the pump is primed with the battery so if your battery is at the end of its life it won't prime properly and will showup the warning light and leave the steering heavy. Most of the times just turning the engine off and restarting it will solve it, longer term fix = changing the battery.

Its a pretty common problem - the pump is primed with the battery so if your battery is at the end of its life it won't prime properly and will showup the warning light and leave the steering heavy. Most of the times just turning the engine off and restarting it will solve it, longer term fix = changing the battery.

Hi there,

Thanks for your response . Sorry for the delay in replying (I look after two kids under the age of three full time!).

You may well be onto something. My car battery died last Saturday. We tried recharging it (removing it from the car and charging it from the mains) but the light still comes on and the steering is heavy. So we can try to change the car battery first I guess.

Someone else has suggested that it may well be a problem with the power steering fluid. Does that sound likely?

Liz

Unlikely to be fluid - the battery is almost always the problem. If a new battery fixes it to begin with, but not after a few runs then it could be the exciter cable that controls the alternator charging the battery or the alternator itself.

If the battery isOK and charges correctly, the next thing to check is the angle sensor (see here), and only in the last instance should you look at the pump. If it IS the pump after all that, make sure you get the right one (there are two!)

HTH

Hi there,

I am new to this webpage so appreciate any advice! I own a Skoda Favba 8V 1.4cc five door hatchback (year 2000). To date its been a great runnner and highly reliable.

Unfortunetely the warning light for the power steering has come on and the steering itself feels very heavy! Has anybody else experienced this?

Many thanks!

My 2002 Tdi started doing the same thing to me. I had the battery & alternator checked (by Halfords) all seemed ok. But a few days later, an emergency RAC callout diagnosed it WAS the alternator not recharging the battery well enough. New alternator & belt seems to have fixed everything. Suggest you NEVER stop the engine & try to re-start it at traffic lights (mid journey) like I did...see quote below. A big thanks to the kind hearted gent who helped me push my car off the roundabout! And thank you too, Briskodians, for this excellent site.

The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.

Albert Einstein