I need some advise!
My first issue with the car in a year and a half of ownership has finally occured. My car is completely stock with approx. 58,000 miles on it. A few weeks ago I left for work, got on the freeway, and noticed that the steering wheel was off center 10-15 degrees to the left...all of the sudden! The car still tracks strait down the road but the wheel now points slightly left. I have not hit any potholes, curbs, etc. so that can't be it. I put the front on jack stands last weekend and inspected for any obvious signs of damage to the front suspention and steering linkage and found none. I checked the PS fluid level and its good as well. Then a strange thing occured when I was pulling out of my neighborhood two days ago. I made the 90 degree right turn onto the main road and the steering wheel was strait; as I proceeded down the road the wheel gradually drifted to the left again. Once on the freeway I could give the wheel a quick little jerk to the right and it would center for a bit then gradually drift back to the left...
Could this possibly be caused by a failing PS rack?
I spoke with my dad (a long time p-car owner) about it and he was stumped.
Has anyone on the board ever experienced this type of behavior before?

Thanks, Kevin

 

I've not had that occur with my 993, but it's pretty clear that you've had some type of failure. Sudden onset of play, drift, sloppiness in steering is never good, never repairs itself and usually gets worse. I'd park that thing until you figure out what's going on. Otherwise, you could be headed for disaster.

Just MHO...

Terry

 

Thanks Terry.
At first I thought it was an alignment problem but after I discovered I could actually effect it and there was play in the system I stopped driving it. I am just trying to avoid expensive diagnosis by the dealer or shop. If it is the rack don’t mind replacing it myself. I was hoping that one of the members had experienced this problem and could tell me if it is indeed the steering rack or something else I missed during my inspection…

Thanks, Kevin

 

If the off center condition occurred suddenly, and the tie rod ends show no unusual play ( 'wiggle' each wheel holding at 3 & 9 o'clock when jacked up),
it is likely that the front camber hold down bolts loosened on one side ( the top allan headed bolt of the two on the bottom flange of the strut is the adjuster, and when loose, the wheel pivots about the bottom bolt).

As little as a 0.2 degree change in camber of one wheel will will create a noticible change in total toe - and push the wheel off center. Park on a level surface and eyeball the side to side camber from the front .... or hold a 2 ft level over the vertical center of each wheel, and look for offset from vertical to the top of the rim with the level pivoted on the bottom lip.

The lower ball joint affecting caster can do the same, but I would guess camber.

The rack cannot do this ... only an effective change of length of the sum of the two tie rods. Ie - loose tie rod adjuster, failed outer or inner rod end ball joint, or camber/caster gone south.

 

I was going to suggest this very thing -- check that they are tight.

 

Ahhhh!
Thanks Garth, that makes sense. I checked the wheels for play when I had it in the air and did not detect any.
One question...since the steering wheel always wants to turn left, do you think my problem is withthe driver's side suspension (my thought) or the other side?

Thanks agian for your insight!

Kevin

YES! This is a great place Chris!

 

Lemme see if I get this right ..... if a camber adjuster loosens, the wheel hub tends to "straighten up" wrt the strut, and go from negative towards zero camber. As the tie rods/rack do not change in total length, and they pivot from the rear side of the hub .... that "toes in" that particular wheel ( ie., the rod length is now too long for the desired toe-in). Therefore, to roll straight ahead, the rack ( and steering wheel) must be pulled off center towards the the excessive toe-in/less camber wheel to regain equal toe side to side.

So .... if you are holding the wheel 10-15 deg counterclockwise to maintain staright ahead, I'd look at the left front .... I think

 

Something like this happened to me recently. Turned out it was one of the bolts in a rear toe link stripped and caused the toe out of the right rear to get extreme. The steering wheel became very off-center. However, I could certainly feel it - the car felt very unstable at speed.

My alignment shop marks every setting with a bright grease pen, so it was very easy to identify the problem since grease pen lines no longer matched up.

 

This is starting to sound a little more complicated than I had hoped. I think that I'll just take it in to Mayo Performance in Euless and let them have a look at it.
I appreciate all of the suggestions guys, I'll post the prognosis soon!

Thanks, Kevin

 

The exact same thing happened to me at the track after 20 minutes of hard driving a couple of months ago. Turned out to be the tie rods. With 68 K miles on them, I guess it was just a warning sign that my tie rods were due for replacement.

 

I checked this out yesterday with a bubble level and found that the driver's side wheel had a slight amount of negative camber where as the passenger side did not. I am going to dig into it this weekend and see if it's something I can address on my own...Thanks agian for the advice!

Kevin