dr_mat

Don't know which bearing was at fault, because my old column got destroyed trying to get the ignition stuff off it. All I know is I could grab hold of the bottom of the column and move the steering wheel - and feel a tiny bit of disconnect, and after swapping it there's no disconnect. Thing is it's not just a rod with a bearing, it's two rods with four bearings and a complicated CV joint in the middle .. (And I don't think the bearings really matter, tbh.) Meanwhile, my VR should have genuine VW, 60k mile wheel bearings, but the hubs/wishbones are all original. My track rods and BJs are new(ish) genuine VW, my bottom ball joints are new(ish) GSF.. There's not much left! That £160 counts the hubs and wishbones? That's not bad at all if so. I had wondered if my front bearings might be iffy. Can't hurt to swap 'em I suppose... Maybe I'll put it on the list! :)

Lambda.

Buy a 2nd hand one. They almost never fail.

"fuel pressure is fine". I suspect it's not the fuel pump. It could be dying under load, but I'd expect the car to cough and splutter rather than just shut down. Up to you, but my money is on engine sensors.

Nothing. Buy 2nd hand ones.

If you get a competent auto electrician he ought to be able to look at the signal from the crank sensor at idle and tell you straight away if it's looking a bit rough. Should be a nice square wave. They lose definition as the magnets break down.. Yes they're expensive, but you might be able to pick up a 2nd hand one as a tester.

Sounds a lot like crank sensor problems. They tend to get worse when the block gets hot (80mph on the motorway would do it), and then the engine won't restart till the block cools down. The only way to diagnose the crank sensor reliably on OBD1 is with an oscilloscope, looking at the traces it's feeding the ECU. Or by buying another one and swapping them .. :) Unfortunately they're not cheap..

GPC sell a pattern part which is structurally identical to the original part, though it proved a complete git to get in without breaking the whole thing ..

They do rip you off on those rear sensors, it's crazy. I think VW's parts pricing is proportional to how long the item stays on the shelf. Very slow moving objects like this go for stupid money, where things they sell lots of are more reasonable.

The steering play is probably the column. It was on mine ... Did you keep the old hubs and stuff Kev? Any visible damage or weakness? What about the costs for doing the hubs/wishbones/bearings and so on (if you don't mind me being nosy.. ;) )?

The VR is the only Corrado that had EDL, which is operated by the ABS system so, yes, the VR uses a completely different ABS setup compared to the other Corrados.

Give it time ... Most of us claim positive and precise steering after everything has been reassembled for a week or so ..

There *is* an intermediate stage of coil pack failure, where the casing cracks. This will allow it to run "ok" sometimes but not others. I'm afraid that just like everything else in Corrado land, this is not quite so black and white, either ...

This is exactly why people prefer to buy a car that has NOT been hacked about at all. Rather buy a car with low miles and no major repair work (on a Corrado? Hah, no chance!!) than one with middling miles and lots of major, potentially bodged, repairs .. Unfortunately the reality is "many new parts" == "many dodgy repairs carried out by best mate who used to own a camper van in 1976 and thinks he's a mechanic".. :) And though it's great for the people who can do it themselves and save money, inevitably there's a section of the car-buying public that would be wary of taking on a car where there's no *receipts* for the work. Swings, meet roundabouts..

Look in the scuttle panel area, it may be that you've had water ingress into the ECU. But this is classic symptoms of a coil pack or HT lead problem, tbh. The general dampness after a night of solid rain is enough to increase the conductivity of the parts of the coil pack that aren't supposed to conduct, if there's any weaknesses in the structure, no matter how small ...

It won't take much leakage through the throttle body to make the revs drop slowly. I think you've answered your own question there ..

Time to strip down clean up and refit the rear ABS cages then I'd say...

Delete the faults and see if they come back. The supply voltage one shows up any time you disconnect the battery. The rear sensor ones show up if the car is on a rolling road. You may still have ABS cage issues, but those codes could be ancient ... It's very rare for the rear sensors to fail electrically, so I'm told.

Interesting. They're increasing the voltages steadily. Better watch that doesn't fry anything sensitive!

Plus it's 35k Euro (for the only one worth having.. ;) ), which probably means £30k ..!

LOL, listen to the voices!!! By the way, yes, a worn PAS pump will make "bubbling" noises. This is caused by cavitation in the fluid at high pressures against the pump vanes where it's not quite sealing properly any more. This is perfectly normal though, and these pumps go on for years like that. I think most people will say they get a bit of that, even on very new cars anyway ..

Why would the belt slip all the time??? Surely it will only slip when the pump is under heavy load - i.e. when you're turning the wheels on solid ground when the car is stationary! It takes much less force to turn the wheels when the car is moving. If you're convinced it's the pump change the pump, but my money is on that belt.

Where do you keep this car? In a vault?? Madness!! (In a good way.. :) )

Hmmm.. I am inclined to think that's normal.. Given that it's much harder to turn the wheels when the car is on cement than when it's on gravel, obviously. I wouldn't bother trying to fix that, unless you are losing fluid or you're losing power steering. A little noise under extreme loads isn't that unusual, even for very new PAS pumps. On the other hand, it might be worth checking the pump drive belt to make sure it's not that that's screeching.

Depends how hard you drive, and what you mean by "without oil". When the warning light comes on you almost certainly still have oil, just not enough to be safe if the engine is worked hard...