PAS suddenly failed (Fortunately in owners driveway)

The battery was very poor, 7.5 volts on cranking. I replaced battery but I have fault code 03803 in the steering assist module that will not clear.

The Ross-Tech site suggests that this is a loss of adaption issue regarding the steering angle sensor.

Autodata and Ross-Tech suggest that a short drive is a prerequisite ofor resetting the steering angle sensor.

(Autodata suggest that this is all that needs to be done as long as there are no other issues)

However, there is a problem.

The car is undrivable! I am no weakling but the steering wheel is almost impossible to turn!

I certainly would not want to take the car onto the public highway in this condition indeed, I doubt if I could even turn it round to get it out of the driveway.

PAS is a nice enough thing to have but manufacturing a vehicle that is uncontrollable should it fail is insane. What would happen if the system packed up while somebody was negotiating a junction or changing lanes on the motorway? It really is that bad!

Anyway. Back to topic.

Is this likley simply to be a re-adaption issue, or am I likley to be looking at something more complex.

(And is there any way of getting some function out of the PAS so the car can be driven?)

Just a thought what if you pump the tyres up to a higher pressure to make the steering easier and see if the car can be driven

Ian

This should be a simple adaption of the steering angle sensor, the only other problem that I have on the VAG vehicles which I see quite a lot is that you'll have one of the wheel speeds not consistent with the others but not bad enough to bring on the abs light. If this happens you will never be able to adapt the angle sensor. I had a customer last week exact same problem, flat battery and then steering light on. Tried adapting the sensor to no avail, live data showed n/s/r wheel speed dropping out. Spent a good half hour on the phone explaining to the customer that to get your steering working and the light out you're going to need a new battery a rear wheel bearing and the sensor due to being seized. He thought I was making it all up, he just couldn't believe all this came about from a flat battery.
If I wasn't in the motor trade I wouldn't believe it either. Anyway hopefully yours is just a straight forward adaption.