[Steering & Suspension] Steering wheel creak

[pondweed]

Putting this up as a new thread as after reviewing all the youtube videos and other posts on this, I cant find anything where things actually discuss the upper column. The noise is plainly rubber or metal/rubber contact and is coming from the upper areas. It has started since I've been trying to solve the lower UJ issues.

I'm wary of the air bag but have taken off the plastic shrouds to top and bottom of the steering column/ignition key. I've used some silicone spray at the base of the wheel but that didn't work. I cannot see how this noise could be "transferred" from top mounts as others have seemed to suggest.

What I would like to get advice on is whether, if the steering is direct and power steering works, is it dangerous to continue to monitor? 

Is there anything I can access by taking the horn push area off and is that easy to do?

56 plate HDi 1.6

[pondweed]

update on this: after driving 40 miles, the creak disappears, so it may have been from disturbance of running the steering rack from end to end and back 15 times as per a youtube video.... to reset the rack calibration. (snake oil?) And perhaps now settled down.

The steering is still stiff though functioning otherwise perfectly... and I'm wondering whether its MOT failure or advisory?

[brodfather11]

One of the causes of stiff steering is the U joint at the bottom of the steering column , some wd 40 or similar sometimes helps. (Assuming your power steering is working)

The top bearings on the front struts can wear and increase the resistance to turning. This sometimes shows up as creaking/clunking when turning hard , or the track rod ends or lower ball joints in the front suspension seizing up.

If your steering is too hard to turn I think that would be a failure if not a advisory.

[pondweed]

a warning - don't spray silicone grease at top end of steering wheel shaft. I still think this has caused my intermittent seat belt warning light which is somehow also strangely connected to the wiper actuation!