Brought my better half a ford ka last year, first car and shes not passed her test yet.a while ago noticed the powersteering fluid was leaking. Had the rack replaced yesterday however new rack is leaking from pipe unions (this is not where the old rack was leaking from, it was the seals on the old rack with the gators filling up) the pipes look to be in realitivily good condisition and even the mechcanic who did the work said he had a really good look at the pipes but couldnt find anything wrong. So really we have 2 possibiltites: 1. we have an infearior quality rack and the ports are just not mating to the pipes correctly or 2. the mechanic screwed up something while fitting it.

I had a glance though the haynes manual today not that i like to rely on them too much as i have found them incorrect in the past, that said twice the manual refers to fitting new O rings to the pipe unions thinking he may have used the old ones and prehaps they just needed replacing thought i'd ask if he fitted new ones, his reply was "there is no Orings" now this strikes me as strange i dont beleive that the pipes have perfectly engineered fine sealing threads, im sure they just have normal corse threads with the concept of a olive/compression tight fit in which case surley it must need an Oring to stop it leaking though the threads? trouble is the mechanic seems to dissagree he did go on to say "the seals at the end of the pipes are an integral part of the pipe and cant be replaced" yet the manual seems adamant that they are replacable an should be replaced when changing the rack, i am going to pick up the old rack tomorrow to see if it happens to have a couple of old Orings still in the ports thinking if the mechanic didnt realise maybe this is why he thinks there are no rings, i am wondering if he is thinking of what im describing as the Oring stitting at the end of the pipe rather than just between the thread and the outer edge of the port so prehaps there is a slight miss understanding between us. Hoping there is some one out there who has changed a rack on a ford ka recently and can confirm if the unions joining the pipes to the rack do or dont have replaceable Orings or not - hopefully they do as if they just need fitting it should be an easy fix for the mechcanic once i can convince him this is the problem... if not answers on a post card please any help welcome as other than my Oring theory both me and the mechanic are drawing a blank here? the thought of replacing the pipes has crossed our minds but due to the cost and that we cant see anything wrong with them and it seems to be leaking from both the forward and return pipe union on the rack surely it has to be an infrearior rack rack or missing Orings/seals rather than the pipes/unions themselves.

Thansk so much

Richard