rack and pinion leak

I noticed on my 95 camry that the passenger side shaft from the rack and pinion is leaking from the shaft where the boot is, I believe it to be leaking because the boot is unfastened and slid up the shaft. I was looking at autozone and see they offer a boot kit for thirty bucks, would this do the trick for me? Also how do you fill the rack back up with fluid?

You probably have a bad oil seal or O-ring on the rack. The boot is not causing the leak. You may just need a new clamp for the boot if it is not torn.

You fill the steering gear housing at the power steering reservoir.

See pages SR-55-73 of the '94 Camry FSM stickied at the top of this forum. Problem seal and O-ring are on page SR-62. You don't need to completely disassemble the steering gear housing, but still, it's not for the faint of heart.

It might be useful to price a used steering gear housing at a salvage yard...

Hopefully you can fix it with a new seal, I had to replace the rack on my 95 and I can tell you that Toyota must have built the car around the damn thing. What a pain in the A$$ to do.

The boot is slid up on the shaft and that is where the fluid is coming out of is the boot that is slid up, I tried to slide the boot back down towards the wheels with my had and when it retracted it spewed fluid out everywhere.

You probably have a bad oil seal or O-ring on the rack. The boot is not causing the leak. You may just need a new clamp for the boot if it is not torn.

You fill the rack at the power steering reservoir.

See pages SR-55-73 of the '94 Camry FSM stickied at the top of this forum. Problem seal and O-ring are on page SR-62. You don't need to completely disassemble the steering gear housing, but still, it's not for the faint of heart.

It might be useful to price a used steering gear housing at a salvage yard...

where can I buy a new seal and oring, and what kind of price are those parts? Thanks for the help

Hopefully you can fix it with a new seal, I had to replace the rack on my 95 and I can tell you that Toyota must have built the car around the damn thing. What a pain in the A$$ to do.

What was yours doing went it had to be replaced?

I found the manual pages you were talking about, there are several orings listed.

O-rings should come from Toyota, but standard ones may work if you can't get them from Toyota. Match their rubber diameter perfectly or don't use them. The overall diameter will probably be a little smaller on the new ones. They stretch with age. The seals and O-rings will be relatively cheap, but a set (which you may have to buy from Toyota) will be expensive. Bring the O-ring to a Toyota parts department to make sure you get the right one if you can buy them individually. They should be able to show you an Illustrated Parts Breakdown and you can choose which ones you need.

Replace any seals and O-rings on parts you have to disassemble. The leaking one is the one closest to the external leak. O-rings have no function except to seal and can never be reused.

All in all, I recommend replacing the steering gear housing with a used one from a salvage yard. I believe you will have to remove the housing to remove the rack and replace the seal. Then you will run into pre-load issues and possibly sealing problems if the O-ring is not the problem (may be the sealing surface). If you find a cracked or pinched O-ring, then you can be pretty sure of the fix. If the O-ring and seal look good, then you are taking a chance. As gator2764 pointed out. Removing and replacing the housing is a serious pain in the neck.

What was yours doing went it had to be replaced?
It was leaking bad from the passenger side and I didn't want to try and take it apart to see if I could fix it. I had to replace the drive shafts as well so I just did it all at once.

Here (http://www.toyotanation.com/forum/t108185.html) is a description of removing and replacing a rack and axles from a '95 V6 (probably pretty similar).