Tie rod boot replacement questions

[16g-95gsx]

Hey, I just was under my car today and noticed I had a boot that was split in half on the steering assembly, between the tie rod and the "gearbox" according to my chilton's manual. There is a brownish oil coming out, looks like power steering fluid. I'm curious how hard it is to replace this boot, as it obviously cant be good to have it torn like that. I generally check over my car quite often, so it most likely happened within the past 400 miles or so at most, all of which were during sunny weather as I dont drive the car on bad weather days. The boot I'm talking about looks similar to a CV boot, and it sheared right in half. Ive attempted to look it up in the chilton's manual, but I'm sure many of you know that manual blows for anything other than general maintenence, so I figure someone on here must have had a similar problem at one point and can point me in the right direction. I'm just curious what actions to take from here to fix it. Thanks for any input you guys can give.

 

[steve]

Sounds like your talking about the bellows that seal the inner tie rods ends to the steering rack. If you have fluid coming out you might need more than the bellows. That could mean the rack seals are leaking.

The Bellows is MR198993 from the dealer. I would expect stores that sell inner tie rod ends to also have the bellows and clamps.

Steve

 

[16g-95gsx]

Is this all stuff that is easily replaced? The fluid is definately there, it was dripping on my face as I was inspecting the boot. What is to be done about the seals? I generally do all my own work, I just have yet to work on the steering aspect of the car, and my manual has minimum information on it.

 

[16g-95gsx]

Would I also have to get a new tie rod end? Also would an allignment be required after this job?

 

[steve]

Is this all stuff that is easily replaced?
What is to be done about the seals?
Would I also have to get a new tie rod end?
Also would an allignment be required after this job?

With the rack leaking like you describe, I expect you'l need to replace or rebuild it.

If it wasn't leaking, replacing the bellows wouldn't require replacing either tie rod end unless they were worn out of damaged. You would need to seperate the outer tie rod end from the inner to put the new bellows on over the inner rod end.
An alignment would be a very good idea after you were done. By marking, measuring, and counting the turns you could get close to where things were to start but unlikely to exactly back to the original settings.

Steve