Power Steering Noise

Scruggs · September 25, 2019

I know I know, another lifted truck with power steering issues. Just hear me out.

Hey guys, I've searched forums up and and down and have not quite found my answer yet... Getting very close to trading this truck, but prefer to fix it...

So I put a 2.5" level lift spacer from RC and some 33" 10 ply mud tires on my truck at 35k. Truck was fine until 58k. Then the struts went bad, presumably due to the spacer kit. So I put on the 2" RC loaded leveling struts in place of the OE struts and spacers. Now I'm getting terrible popping noises in my ball joints when I turn, and found that the upper control arms are bottoming on the cross member. So I ordered a Cognito 2.0 adjustable coilovers kit with ACAs to solve that issue. Haven't put it on yet as I'm still waiting for it to get here. As I'm waiting, now I'm hearing a faint binding noise when I turn left and right, but only when I'm sitting still and not moving, though it isn't harder to turn. You can't feel or hear a difference in steering otherwise, and probably wouldn't notice it if you had the AC and radio on. It sounded to me like binding in the power Steering rack and pinion.

I took it to the dealer and they can't find anything wrong with anything. It was killing me, so I crawled up underneath the truck and put my hands on the tie rods while i had my wife turn the wheel. Sure enough I feel shocks running through the tie rods. Now I'm freaking out. I've read that removing the RC lifts have solved that issue, but I'm not sure what to do. I didn't have an issue at 2.5". Should I try going back to 2.5" when I get the lift in? I will add that I am having other wierd intermittent issues like my screen going black randomly, and audio randomly not working (radio, turn signal clickers, Bluetooth, etc...). I load tested my battery 3 times and it said the battery is bad... I'm only getting 320 cca when it's a 720 cca battery, which is 5 years old. If my battery is going bad could that cause my power steering rack not get enough current and make noise? Or am I dreaming for a coincidence and I need to accept it's because of my lift?

Any help is appreciated. Thanks.