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I bought my new Eos in October 2007. In February 2008 I took it into my local VW dealer Citygate Volkswagen, South Ruilsip, Middlesex UK They took it on a road test and said that it needed a new steering rack and duly installed one under the warranty.
On 13th November 2008 about a mile from my home I lost control of the car. I later realised that the steering had suffered a catastrophic failure. I felt relieved that this had occurred on a minor road when I was going slowly and no one had been hurt. The previous day I had been on a long motorway journey with my wife. Had I lost control then at 70 mph I may not have been here to write this note.
I called my breakdown company. The technician removed the cover under the steering column and exposed the universal joint at the bottom of the column.
The lower part of the u/j consists of a clamp which grips onto a male shaft on the steering rack through which the turning motion is transferred. The shaft has longitudinal grooves to ensure it grips firmly when the bolt on the clamp is tightened. I gather the end of the shaft incorporates a protrusion which goes behind the bolt so that it would be impossible for the shaft to work loose when the bolt is firmly in place.
The technician said that the shaft had come completely away from the universal joint even though the bolt was tight. He was most emphatic on this latter point. He said he had seen nothing like this before. At my request he recorded his observations on paper. I also took photograph of the u/j before he reconnected it to the shaft. It showed the bolt was tight.
I subsequently took the car Citygate Volkswagen, and gave them copies of the note and photograph and explained what had happened. They took it in for repair. I later raised the possibility with one of their staff that two components may not have been fitted securely when the steering rack was changed. I was told that this was unlikely as he thought that there was no need to disconnect them when a new rack was fitted. I later learnt that this was not necessarily the case.
When they called to say the car was ready I was told that the bolt had been replaced. I asked to be given the old bolt. Later, I was told the bolt had not been replaced; it had been treated with Locktite and retightened.
I fed these events back to VW’s UK headquarters’ Customer Care Department. They asked Citygate Volkswagen to investigate and report back. Citygate Volkswagen in their report said:
“ The investigation concluded that all of our safety & quality procedures were fulfilled in the original & consequent repairs. It is not possible for us to know what may have happened in the intervening months between the original repair in February 2008 and the failure in November 2008, a period of 9 months.”
At no point had Citygate Volkswagen asked me what had happened to the car in those intervening months. Nothing in fact had been done to the car that would have had any impact on the steering.
In February this year I asked Citygate Volkswagen if, just to be on the safe side, they had re-called any similar work to check that it had been carried out correctly. They said they had not done so.
I believe this was the wrong approach as the most plausible cause of the failure was that when the new steering rack was fitted the shaft was not pushed in far enough into the clamp before the bolt was tightened. Consequently the protrusion did not sit behind the bolt securing the shaft properly into place. Gradually with use over the months the shaft worked its way loose.
I would be interested in the comments of any other Eos owners.
On 13th November 2008 about a mile from my home I lost control of the car. I later realised that the steering had suffered a catastrophic failure. I felt relieved that this had occurred on a minor road when I was going slowly and no one had been hurt. The previous day I had been on a long motorway journey with my wife. Had I lost control then at 70 mph I may not have been here to write this note.
I called my breakdown company. The technician removed the cover under the steering column and exposed the universal joint at the bottom of the column.
The lower part of the u/j consists of a clamp which grips onto a male shaft on the steering rack through which the turning motion is transferred. The shaft has longitudinal grooves to ensure it grips firmly when the bolt on the clamp is tightened. I gather the end of the shaft incorporates a protrusion which goes behind the bolt so that it would be impossible for the shaft to work loose when the bolt is firmly in place.
The technician said that the shaft had come completely away from the universal joint even though the bolt was tight. He was most emphatic on this latter point. He said he had seen nothing like this before. At my request he recorded his observations on paper. I also took photograph of the u/j before he reconnected it to the shaft. It showed the bolt was tight.
I subsequently took the car Citygate Volkswagen, and gave them copies of the note and photograph and explained what had happened. They took it in for repair. I later raised the possibility with one of their staff that two components may not have been fitted securely when the steering rack was changed. I was told that this was unlikely as he thought that there was no need to disconnect them when a new rack was fitted. I later learnt that this was not necessarily the case.
When they called to say the car was ready I was told that the bolt had been replaced. I asked to be given the old bolt. Later, I was told the bolt had not been replaced; it had been treated with Locktite and retightened.
I fed these events back to VW’s UK headquarters’ Customer Care Department. They asked Citygate Volkswagen to investigate and report back. Citygate Volkswagen in their report said:
“ The investigation concluded that all of our safety & quality procedures were fulfilled in the original & consequent repairs. It is not possible for us to know what may have happened in the intervening months between the original repair in February 2008 and the failure in November 2008, a period of 9 months.”
At no point had Citygate Volkswagen asked me what had happened to the car in those intervening months. Nothing in fact had been done to the car that would have had any impact on the steering.
In February this year I asked Citygate Volkswagen if, just to be on the safe side, they had re-called any similar work to check that it had been carried out correctly. They said they had not done so.
I believe this was the wrong approach as the most plausible cause of the failure was that when the new steering rack was fitted the shaft was not pushed in far enough into the clamp before the bolt was tightened. Consequently the protrusion did not sit behind the bolt securing the shaft properly into place. Gradually with use over the months the shaft worked its way loose.
I would be interested in the comments of any other Eos owners.
