VT sedan turning issue

[shdai]

G'day guys

Just wondering if someone could shed some light on a turning issue im having. Its nothing major but its beginning to annoy me. Basically, when you turn left the car acts normal and the steering wheel naturally returns to its original position, however, when i turn right, i find i have to reef the steering wheel back to straight. Mostly occurs on roundabouts and sharper corners. Its like the steering wheel gets stuck on something almost.

I've gone through the front end and cant find anything abnormal on either side. Ive done a bolt check and everything seems to be tight. Any ideas what might be causing this? Bushes are all ok, relatively new nolathane lower control arm bushes, sway bar link bushes and caster bushes.

Cheers

 

[BlackoutSteve]

Jack the front end, and disconnect the tie rods on both sides so you can pivot each wheel independently and feel for any resistance and/or binding..
There could be bad upper strut bearing/s at the top (as they often lose their lube and get rusty with road water & crud) or less likely a bad ball joint.
This could be on either or both sides. (If you replace bearings, replace the tops strut bushings and strut boots if perished also. The top strut bushings, very likely may have collapsed as they do.)

Castor is what naturally returns the steering back to center. The more the castor, the stronger it will return.
Unsure why only returning from left turns, perhaps your front end needs setting up and their is less than specified castor on one side.

Check your parts before you spend money on an alignment, otherwise if the alignment doesn't fix and you then find a bad part, you'll need to get an alignment again after replacing it.

 

[shdai]

thanks for the heads up mate.

I can safely say the strut top mounts and bearings were also replaced with nolathane ones about 1000kms ago. So i doubt they could be worn out already. Im using the adjustable caster bushes and there is a quarter degree more caster on the left than front but wouldn't think that would cause the steering to get stuck turning right? I did do a bit of research on here and someone mentioned in another thread it could possibly be the valves in the rack playing up on one side. I will give what you said a go and see what happens.

Cheers

 

[BlackoutSteve]

If you find no difference in the turning resistance when disconnecting the tierods, then yes you can assume the rack.
And if the rack, I reckon you should be able to feel it through the steering wheel too.

 

[shdai]

alright, cool. Appreciate the help bud. Hopefully its a bush of some sort cos massive cbf replacing the rack.

 

[gm1961]

Hi All

My VP done that same problem after the rack was replaced, problem with the rebuild , i took it back to days later and told them to keep the car and fix my original rack ( they told me they just remove your old and replace with some ones elses fixed one )
All good after that

regards
george