Steering Problem, Insight needed!

[ice745]

I have a '94 Camry LE.

I just brought the car over to a garage on Sat., They put new front struts on and did an alighnment. When I was driving it Monday, if I let go of the wheel, the wheel would turn slightly to the right and consequently the car would pull to the right. I figured they fudged the alighnment. Then Tues. I was driving it, and after a while it was fine, I could let go of the wheel with no problem. Then, after a while, if I let go of the wheel it would turn itself to the left slightly. Then after a while it was fine, then it went bakc to the right, but a lot worse. If I keep my hands on the wheel the whole time it'll be fine, but I have to make slight correction to the left every once in a while. I put it back in today, they tried rotating tires, and realigning 3 times, but can't seem to fix it. They say tomorow they will have a troubleshooter in to look at it, and see if he can do anything.

I was hoping someone on here may have an idea or any help at all, please.

[Mike Gerber]

Have they checked the calibration of their alignment machine? I had something like this happen to me and the tech noticed it before giving me back the car. He moved the car to another alignment machine and redid everything. The car returned to normal.

Mike

[ice745]

I don't know if they did, but I just did some tests of my own, because I noticed some squeaking noise while turning the wheel. I then took it home, and turned the wheel all the way right, and all the way left, each time I hit the stop points I noticed the thicker line from the power steering resevoir would jerk, and then the pump started making a loud hissing noise (I don't know if this is normal) once I let go of the wheel and it eased itself the hissing stopped immediately. I then got the car up to 40 mph on a back road, put it in neutral and cut the engine, and the steering was completely fine (I didn't know of any other way of temp. disabling power steering). It kept the car straight and didn't want to turn at all, unless of course I turned the wheel. I then hand-braked and restarted the engine, and of course the problem came back. So I am almost certain it is a power steering problem, but I'm not sure where exactly, if its the pump or the valves, or maybe even just the belt :-\ I don't know much about how the system works.

Thank you for your fast reply

[ice745]

:-/ errmmm I tried that neutral with the engine cut off trick a few more times, and the car still does want to turn either left or right depending. I don't know what it depends on, just whatever it feels like. I jacked up front-end, and started it. The wheels don't auto-turn, it seems just when its on the ground and moving. I tried accelerating a bit while jacked, and still no auto-turning. One thing I noticed tho, I can manually rotate the wheels while in Park, I don't know if that is bad, but when its on the ground I can't push the car in park, so thats good at least. I don't see any parts that are clearly damaged, except it looks like I have a slow leak around the oil pan gasket, but that shouldn't be related. Every once in a while there is a whirring noise while I turn the wheel, that sounds like its coming from just behind the steering wheel, in the dash or something.

The other thing I think may be causing it, is since all my struts weren't in good shape at all, I actually bottomed out the suspension just pulling in the drive-way (before I had the fronts replaced) I wonder if having the new fronts and the awful backs is offsetting the car enough to make it want to pull to a certain direction. I don't know if that would explain the randomness in the direction it wants to pull.

[Mike Gerber]

I don't think any of the things you mentioned would cause the problem you are experiencing. The new front stuts shouldn't cause a problem as long as both were changed. The oil leak is unrelated. The pump noise when turned all the way to one side also sounds normal. If they don't find anything wrong with their equipment, make sure they check all the front suspension components; tie rods, ball joints, etc. If you don't think they are qualified, take the car to a suspension specialist. Steering problems are not something to fool around with. I'm still leaning toward an alignment problem here.

By the way, you never said if you had this problem before the front struts and the alignment were done.

Mike

[ice745]

The problem started after they did the work. I've never had this problem beforehand.