Hi,

I am experiencing that my Fiat Panda 08, loses the Electric power steering when driving. This happens only when the weather is cold. It happens when I turn left or right and I hear a sound (ping) from the Dashboard and then three warning lights show up. Among them the electrical power steering light. As soon as this happens the power steering is gone. If I turn the car off and back on, it is working normally again. I will try to upload a image in here to show the three warning lights. Do you guys have any ideas for a solution, as this can be quite dangerous.

Best regards
Niklas Sørensen

As always, as you say that this happens when it's cold, the first recommendation will be to change the battery if it's any way old. Buy a good brand such as Bosch. It's amazing how many power steering faults have been cured this way. If that doesn't work then come back for further advice.

When was the battery last changed?

Many of these problems are purely battery related & it's going to have a bigger load on it in cold weather. If you do a search in this section you'll see loads of threads where steering failure has been down to the battery.

We had a cold snap last week and I went out playing in the snow in my 2007 4x4. I left it parked with the lights on while I took photos and the power steering failed as I started off again. After running the engine for a few mins and turning off & back on everything came back fine.

I didn't panic as the battery is an unknown age & I've seen loads of these threads. If it does it again I'll just change the battery even though it's not showing any other sign of trouble.

I agree though it's pretty disconcerting when the pas fails and the dash lights up! A Panda is pretty heavy with no pas too - and I'm used to old Fiat's with no such modern witchcraft!