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Steering rack n pinion sticking?


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Ok, I have had my car for 8 months now. Ever since I got it I have an issue when making a full lock turn. That is when I turn fully left or right and then center back straight the car wants to pull to the direction i did the full turn to. I have had the car aligned again recently. All front suspension is new.

 

So, do I have a faulty rack? Car has less than 90,000 miles but is 39 years old!

 

 

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Thoughts:

 

The race guys suggest some toe out-I like a little toe-in to avoid wandering and darting on the street or strip. Does it pull at the same intersection-with wider tires, my car pulls on rutted surfaces-a lot. Put my skinny front tires on and that gets lots better. I tried to get the slack out of my rack once by tightening the big adjustment screw and it kind of acted like you are describing. Try backing that screw off just a touch. I now accept a little bit of play in the rack and all is cool. Have you greased the rack? Lack of grease?

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No I have not greased it or any maintenance attention to it at all. I made a hard left hand u-turn on a 6 lane road yesterday and got on it 1-5 gear and realized I was really fighting the steering wheel from making the car go left. I thought I was just spinning HAHA!

 

So, I tried a hard u-turn to the right and it does the same thing. So I will look at greasing the pinion and maybe backing off on the tightness. 

Thanks

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The two bushings that hold your rack to the frame may be worn or broken, allowing the rack to move. 

 

 This problem happened to me when I changed these bushings to polyurethane a long time ago and didn't realize there are two different racks that require a slightly thicker bushing on one side if you have a 280 rack vs a 240 rack. I was happy to find how easy it was to put that bushing in, but then couldn't figure out why doing a left turn left my wheel uncentered left, then doing a right turn left it un-centered right...  The rack was shifting enough to cause it. Turns out I had a 280 rack and had put the 240 bushing in. (the bounding flanges on the driver side bushing are slightly further apart on the 280 rack). 

 

Have a look, might be your issue.

Edited by z240
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