Technical red steering wheel on start up.

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Technical red steering wheel on start up.

Liam1804

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Feb 23, 2019
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hi all,

every time i start the vehicle the red steering light stays on, its only when you move the steering wheel it then goes out, power steering works fine. ive scanned the car for any faults codes and the only 1 thats the issue is a torque sensor fault. anybody experienced this and what was the fix? ive read the mk2 puntos showed this type of fault when the battery was on its way out, wondered if the grande was the same
 
So it's noting the Steering is not passing the 'Start Up Test' and this is being stored as its torque sensor fault. This will be a power problem (the steering takes a lot of amps to work). But power is provided by the battery down the positive lead and back by the negative. These sort of faults are always a bad earth, You can test this by using Jump Leads from the negative to the engine and negative to the body.

Plenty of posts (and guides) on fixing a bad earth.
 
So it's noting the Steering is not passing the 'Start Up Test' and this is being stored as its torque sensor fault. This will be a power problem (the steering takes a lot of amps to work). But power is provided by the battery down the positive lead and back by the negative. These sort of faults are always a bad earth, You can test this by using Jump Leads from the negative to the engine and negative to the body.

Plenty of posts (and guides) on fixing a bad earth.
I've checked the battery and noticed white powder type substance around the bottom. New battery ordered.

Theres only 2 earth leads coming off the battery, I assume that's correct? 1 to the body below the battery and another one held on the battery terminal with a 10mm nut, reading some posts it seems the one with the 10mm nut is for the power steering. I did try the jump lead trick but it was still the same. Ill change them anyway if a new battery doesn't solve it
 
My earth lead to the body had corroded in the sleeve at the body end. It looked fine but was doing nothing. The second lead goes to the top of the gearbox and you can't see its condition. The power steering will be earthing through the body so concentrate on that.
 
Did you fix this? I tried battery and still have same issue.
Sometimes (more often than not) it’s a torque sensor fault, it’s part of the electronic steering colun, either replace the whole column or replace the sensor, the sensor on its own requires a lot of pulling things apart and putting back together, takes a lot of time so the best option If able to do it yourself
 
Did you fix this? I tried battery and still have same issue.
Sorry for the late reply, I also replaced the battery but the fault is still present to this day. Car drives perfect, its just the red light on start up, but goes away soon as you move the steering wheel. I haven't really bothered to investigate since
 
It won't be the battery. It's the Earth Wire to the body.
Same problem like these on a gp abarth , only at start up and if i switch off /on becames normal,steering always normal too ( the earth to body is the one of the gearbox?
Best regards
 
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