If anyone sees this as can give me some advice in the next few hours, I need to make a decision:
Dealer just called me back, he said the EPS motor and maybe an associated sensor (he couldn't give me the name of it off-hand) are bad and need to be replaced.
He said that the EPS motor is only orderable as integrated with an entire new steering column installation, there's only one in stock in the country, and it'll take a week to get in.
Quoted me $1500 + tax for the steering column (including EPS motor) replacement. Says he cannot get just EPS motor by itself, it is not orderable as a stand-alone part on his end.
Does this seem a little excessive to anyone else? I told him to give me some time to loop back with him...I've seen the photos in this thread:
https://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=133606
and it is quite obvious to me from these photos and the instructions that the entire EPS motor can be removed without replacing the entire steering column...am I missing something?
Should I tell them I'll just pay the troubleshooting, bring the car home, order the EPS motor off Ebay, and try and install it from the instructions from the link I posted above and see if that fixes it and saves me $1,350+?
Or does someone know if the EPS motor is truly mated with the steering column and the entire mechanism needs to be changed out?
Please help if anyone has any more knowledge than me, trying to decide if I want to drop $2,000+ because the dealer says it's their only way to fix it, or if I can just order the EPS motor and replace that by itself.
Any idea what sensor he may be talking about that might need replaced with it? If there was actually a bad sensor, it surely would have thrown a code in all of my testing, right?