Wheel alignment and steering wheel in Sydney

[Sascha]

Question: I'm after recommendations for places in Sydney that do wheel alignments that don't leave me with a steering wheel off centre. Appreciate any thoughts and help.

Over the years I had plenty of wheel alignments. However, most times the steering wheel was off centre to the right by 4-5 degrees afterwards. Every time I had to go back and get it adjusted, which basically makes it two trips for every wheel alignment. The mechanics usually say it's "pretty much" centred and as good as they can't test on the local roads. It feels very much like trial and error, as opposed to a proper process or procedure.

Now, I find that rather unacceptable to be honest. When driving long distance this is exceptionally irritating. That is having to steer right to go straight. Not a problem I encountered ever in Europe, perhaps the roads are different.

I'm not familiar with the details of how the wheel alignment works unfortunately and it's not clear to me what the dependency between the wheel alignment and the steering wheel is. I assume the steering wheel is an outcome, but unclear how both can be achieved, proper alignment and a straight steering wheel.

Thank you!
Sascha

[Old Farang]

While I have no experience with your Range Rover, it is usually a very simple matter to adjust the steering wheel to centre. The drag link from whatever the steering box is, to the first connection point of the steering arms just needs to be either lengthened or shortened. Adjusting the drag link has no affect on the wheel alignment.

[DiscoDB]

No drag link involved. The steering column goes direct to the steering rack which has two equal length tie rods going to either side.

Assuming when the alignment was done the steering was centred and pointing straight ahead, and the tie rods were initially set at the same length before the front toe is adjusted, then the LR procedure is to pull and reposition the steering wheel if it is more than 3 degrees out. Also could need a steering recalibration if adjusted.

So you definitely want to find a place very familiar with these vehicles before getting an alignment.