Ford Mondeo Mk4 power steering reservoir replacement

As previously mentioned in our blog on steering faults for MK4 Mondeo's it is a recommendation to change the reservoir bottle when changing the steering rack.

On the MK4 Mondeo with a belt-driven power steering pump, the ford part number for this reservoir is - 178905.
Ford has introduced a modification to this reservoir in the form of an extra filter in the return port of the bottle. It is imperative that this filter is removed after 5 minutes of running the vehicle and before it is driven.
To remove this filter simply undo the cap and look for the orange ring pull that sits just above the max fluid level mark, grab the end of the ring pull and extract the attached filter out through the top of the reservoir bottle.
After removal, the fluid level will need to be topped up.
Failure to remove this filter will result in the fluid aerating in the bottle and overflowing, also the pump will become very noisy and there can be some loss of assistance.