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[Jukeboxnut]

I have just replaced my wife's old Vectra estate for a 2005 Ford Focus Mk2 2.0 petrol estate.  This has electrically assisted power steering which is supposed to be a non service item but after removing the n/s headlight I found the reservoir which is half empty.  A dip with a cable tie showed a clear sweet smelling oil (reminiscent of Castrol XL 20/50 if anyone here is old enough to remember that).  A quick trip to the local Ford dealer provided me with a litre of power steering fluid to Ford specification WSS-M2C204-A2 which is green and smells slightly bitter, nothing like the oil I found.  I rang another dealer to double check with registration number and they insisted the green stuff is correct and a check with my son's 2007 Mondeo, which has a conventional mechanical power steering showed that oil in his car is green so I can at least use it in his car.  My question is does anyone here have experience with the oil spec. for the Focus because I am reluctant to use the green stuff in case it cases damage to the electric pump.

[Chazza12]

i would recommend removing the old fluid also checking why the fluid id down so low, usually they don't drop in oil unless something is wrong, also they have changed the power steering fluid some of the oil fluids used corroded the lines so now use a different formula that don't allow water or corrosion to happen and yes its a bitter smell on new oil.   

[tidla]

Had a similar thing on a vw, which used the mineral fluid (green). A leak had occurred and someone had topped it up with normal (red) fluid which didnt help much at all.

[frostbite]

The green fluid is pentosin chf 11s. My volvo v70 used it but the 850 used dexron 3

dont mix them it will make it leak, lots of wrecked s/c/v70 pumps about because they were topped up with dexron

[STEMO]

First of all...have you got the the information which tells you the level the fluid should be in the reservoir? If it's a totally sealed system, the half-full level may be the correct level to allow for back flow or expansion.
Secondly.....once you have found this information, and concluded that the level is low, then surely the system should be looked at rather than just topped up?

[Jukeboxnut]

Thank you for the quick replies, I will check the correct level as wisely suggested by STEMO because despite its mileage of 113,000 I can find no trace of a leak so perhaps the fluid level is OK.