background info
Steering suddenly went stiff as I was turning. No leaks, no alerts.

existing clunking sound in front right, which was a broken strut mount/plate. dealer thought this may be the issue in stiffness, got it fixed, was not the problem.

service advisor said it may be a steering rack issue, crossing my fingers that it is not. he suggested that I get them to diagnose the electric as it could be the variable assist relay or a cable.

I talked to the tech working on my car who drove it around a bit. He said the steering rack felt fine and that there was power steering (he said if there wasn't any power steering, I wouldnt be albe to turn the wheel).

He said that system has defaulted into the heaviest setting (for highway driving) and to have them run electrical tests to see if it has a faulty relay.


questions
1. I'm thinking of asking a friend to test the relay if I can find it instead of having the dealership charge me for it- where is it located? by the steering column?

2. in the event that it IS a faulty relay, is this as simple as sourcing a new relay, unplugging the faulty relay and replacing it with the new one? or does this process need to be done at the dealership with a special process/software/programming? I drove a jeep before this and have switched out relays, but this car's electrical sounds/looks complicated from reading about it.


p/n for the relay is 31360094. (part 22 in -->) http://volvopartslisle.com/assembly/?assembly=63515065 is the assembly - where is this assembly located and how to access?


Thanks guys!