I am getting all new rubber tomorrow am and decided to take the traction control off and do a sustained doughnut....might as well have some innocent fun wearing through the rest of the old rubber, right?

I took the car to about 5 miles an hour to protect the clutch and cut the wheel hard left and nailed it. 3 or 4 perfect doughnuts ensued.

The issue is my car now feels extremely heavy to turn at slow speed (thing hand over hand over hand for a 90 degree turn). It also makes a slight ticking/buzzing from the front when I turn back and forth at speed....

Any ideas what happended? Is it the power steering?

 

So I lifted up the car on my 4 post and there is an orange/gold fluid on the floor and under everything on the drivers side. (picture)

I followed it up under the car and it seems to have come from this cylinder (see picture). Any ideas on what this may be?

Initial thoughts are coolant, but why would the steering be suffering?

Image on left is under the car and shows the drips-Image on right is upside down....the cylinder is behind the tube and the tube appears to go to the block.

 

First thing I would check is the steering fluid level. The cap is front right (i.e. driver's side).

 

Thanks, forgot to mention that I checked the power steering and its fine. The fluid is green for power steering.

This fluid is orange/gold. Will check coolant levels when car cools, but I identified the area that "blew" in the picture of the cylinder above. In looking at the Aston service manual, it appears to be right by the thermostat/water pump.

 

Can't tell from your picture, but could it be some kind of ruptured fluid-filled engine mount?

 

XJ-That sounds bad, never even heard of that before.

 

liquid-filled mounts aren't that uncommon. i've seen them on BMWs and Subarus. they're not as stiff as solid mounts, but don't compress like they would if they were hollow (due to the liquid). however, they tend to be failure-prone (Subaru used them for a year before reverting back to solid mounts, and the ones in the E46 330i i used to have basically crumbled in my hands). but from what i've seen of the construction of V8 Vantages, i'd be surprised if they had liquid-filled mounts. i could be wrong, but i'd expect all of our mounts to be solid.

i can't tell what it could be from the pics. is the liquid watery (like water/coolant/etc) or slick (like oil)?

 

Thanks Telum-Appreciate the education on the matter.

The fluid spill appears to be near the front of the engine by the thermostat and seems to be more of a water based brownish color, rather than an oil based. Again, it seems to be tied to steering somehow as the car feels like its lost power steering at slow speeds.

I checked all levels (coolant, power steering, oil) and all are at appropriate levels so now I am even more concerned. I will not be driving the car to have tires put on thats for sure.

 

These pictures should help more with both the color and where it spilled out of.
All fluid levels are topped off

 

somewhere in texas a dealer is salavating.

 

Hmm I'm interested to see what this is. The power steering reservoir is just to the right of there, but it looks like a pretty sturdy unit so any splash-capable leak would be obvious. And power steering fluid (ATF) wouldn't be very watery. The first pic is looking directly at the air-oil separator, but that shouldn't be it - if it leaks, it'll be oil. But even if that was the case, it wouldn't splash like that, it would seep down the hose connected to the bottom of the AOS (I replaced mine a month ago, it's cheap and easy), and I don't know how that would affect your steering.

 

Also, the color looks wrong for either oil or power steering fluid. Maybe send a PM to irish07 or AMfixer if they don't chime in here.

 

curved ball idea but have you checked the damper on that side hasn't blown its oil out?

 

It is very hard to tell from the pictures. But that spill.jpg is the oil seperator. The second I no idea what im looking at. The thermostat hose is under all that, but I can't tell anything.

 

Thanks for all the input guys.

AMFixer-the spill.jpg is where all the mess originated from. It looks like it came out of the plastic cylinder-is that the oil seperator? Upon further review, the liquid is a very light light oily feeling. Not near as thick as engine oil.

The second is a picture under my car of the drip just to show the color. it has nothing to do with the issue.

Telum-per above I think thats what leaked (badly) and after reading your post I touched the liquid and its a light oil. I'm hopeful AMFixer can chime in on if he has seen this leak before and how serious it is.

Mikey-had not even thought of that one, would be a good call but the mess origionated from the oil seperator it looks like.