Originally Posted by Mark14SQ5

I had the steering failure twice, lost power steering and warning on dash. The two times failed, there was no way to reset failure mode. It failed while I was driving the 1st time. The Audi dealer replaced my steering rack and pinion assembly two years in a row. This year 2016-17 in the winter in Minnesota we only had a few days at -10F to -18F and no repeat failures. The local dealer told me that they know every year certain Q5, SQ5, A4, A5 will have this steering failure. The new R&P assy part number they installed had to be ordered from Germany took one week. They gave me a free rental audi until fix completed. The Part Number was 8R1-423-055-BG. The 1st replacement in Jan 2014 was same Part number as this new one but was a rev ending in AJ. I was told the steering motor on the new rack and pinion assy is stronger and tighter tolerances. I would suggest anyone with this failure must have the dealer replace the rack and pinion.

Originally Posted by wilber

Just received a letter from Audi today extending the steering system warranty to 10 years 200,000km on my 2013 Q5.

Originally Posted by FerQuest

What did you do to get that letter? I have the same year (2013) Q5 and 3 days ago I got the alert. But the car was sitting under the sun for 2 months (I got sick).
Would you please be so kind and share the knowledge you have on the process so that others can benefit of it?
Thanks!

Originally Posted by Dexter1110

I had an unpleasant event with my 3 month old 3,300 km SQ5 yesterday and I'm posting this because I haven't found anything like it in threads and I would have liked to know that this could happen. Had this happened at higher speed this could have been dangerous, and advanced warning may help others.On a cold Saturday morning (-21C) I warmed the SQ5 for 10 mins before packing the family and heading out. First kilometer was fine. After heading up a steep hill I made a stop, turned right, and the red steering wheel fault light came on with 3 warning beeps. The steering wheel became extremely stiff and could not turn enough to avoid a parked car in the opposite lane. Luckily there was little traffic and I was able to simply stop before hitting the car. I backed up and experimented with the steering wheel to realize it was barely steerable but only with a LOT of force. Under the red fault warning a message said to stop driving the car immediately. No kidding, had we been on an offramp at 100+ km/h this could have been a high velocity accident!

Audi "care" as usual is simply a polite voice on the line, and said the delay for towing was 90 mins. That seemed too long a wait with a 2 year-old in the back seat at -21C so I took the car back home slowly using the early morning deserted side streets. Audi "care" had also said that the car would sit in the dealership lot until it reopened on Monday morning so I put the car in the garage overnight hoping that warming it up would prove helpful. No luck as the same red fault message and rock hard steering response remained, so on Sunday I called back Audi "care" for a flatbed tow truck. To make this story complete, the first guy who showed up came in a CAA van (no flatbed) wanting to boost the car... Finally, after a polite exchange of words with the polite voice on the line and another 90 mins later, the SQ5 was on a flatbed on the way towards the dealership.

So the aim of this post is to warn people that if the electromechanical steering system fails while driving the steering wheel will become rock hard and barely responsive. Be ready to steer with all your strength... At the present time I'm not certain whether I still trust this car will keep the family safe.