Thread: Steering shake

I got that frustrated by my steering issues i was going to mount a camera under the car to try and record any movement to identify, but finally found it.

Might be an easy option? Like a little gopro or something strapped in just the right spot. Might show some movement otherwise not visible.

So, had a bit of a go at it today. 1st thing i found when i went to disconnect the tie rod from the rhs swivel, was it came straight out of the taper when the nut was removed. Seems the washer under the nut was sitting on the shoulder at the base of the thread, tightening up against it leaving the taper a bit loose.

Checked the swivel preload, was so loose it couldnt make a spring scale even move , just swung swivel. Lots of oils about, so stripped it down and replaced the seals. Ended up taking .010" of shims out on reassembly to get the preload to just over 1kg.

Ran outta daylight, so will refill swivel and take it for a test drive tomorrow and see whats its like before swapping steering rods over from my other car. Thinking the lack of preload and loose tie rod is enough to cause me problems tho......

Yea mate i agree, a loose tie rod could certainly be giving you the symptoms you have.
All in all a good find and easy fix. If your going to swap out one rod end i suggest doing both.

While you have now probably found the problem, the way to check tie rod ends is to get someone SWMBO? to gently turn the steering side to side while you have your hand enveloping the tie rod ends. You will soon feel if they move vertically rather than horizontally only. Similarly with the Panhard rod it is easy to see movement.

In my 91 RRC it always had a steering twitch when hitting a bump. I changed everything except the RH swivel. when I finally opened it up I found that the top bearing outer had not been driven completely home at the factory AGGGH!

BTW, it is my experience that on a high mileage car that you need to replace the swivel bearings rather than just redo the preload as they wear at the straight ahead and while may be tight when using a beam balance they have slop at straight ahead from Brinelling. The top one is the main problem as it takes all the load.
There are 2 types of shimmy, one where the wheels both go in the same direction and the other where the wheels go in opposite directions and that gives a clue to where the problem lies. Same direction =panhard rod or bushes, opposite =tie rod ends or swivels.
Regards Philip A

Swivel brgs look good, guessing been replaced as its def been apart before. Car has just clicked over 200k.
Rechecked toe when i got it back together, went from 1 mm to 4mm toe in, so the tierod was definatly not sitting right before.
Seems a lot better, still a slight shake on rough corners, could just the the tyres ( dynapro m/t 265/75's), mite replace all the rod ends and damper anyway.

So what's the toe at now??

Originally Posted by Vern

So what's the toe at now??

Reset back to 1mm toe out

Damper replacement wont help at all.
I learned that the hard way. Buying a new one thinking it would help. Infact my car drives the same if not better without the damper on road.

I believe the dampers use is to stop the steering jarring when it ruts etc. I could be wrong though.