Diagnosis help (2 Viewers)

[TWILLY]

I am hoping that folks on here who are more mechanically inclined than I (which is any of you) can help me think through and diagnose (or narrow down) a steering problem. My searches show several possible causes.

The symptom is this:

Without steering input from me, my Land Cruiser's front wheels follow, steer into, and track even slight wheel ruts or grooves on paved or dirt roads. Counteracting this requires more and more attention.

It's a 92 80 series with:

• 33 x 12 KO2s, 1 yr old, pretty good about keeping them rotated and aired evenly
• Newish OME springs and Rancho shocks (1 yr old, sitting at 23" from hub center to wheel well base)
• New tie rod and drag link ends
• New control arm bushings (no caster correction)
• New steering stabilizer (1 yr old)
• Otherwise stock; no axle or knuckle rebuilds have been done.

The new bushings and ends helped some. Mechanics say front wheel bearings look fine. Sway bar bushings are toast.

Questions:

Could this be a symptom of bad sway bar bushings? (I'll be replacing them to find out)

If not sway bar bushings, what might be the next likely culprits?

Thanks in advance for any feedback.

T

 

[LandCruiserPhil]

Have your caster read. Based on the info above you need caster badly.

 

[Pitch]

I would lean towards caster correction being needed.

 

[Ken in AZ]

Chech the caster on an alignment machine. Next look at the front trackbar bushing. If the swaybar bushing are toast then the panhard bushing may also be gone. Other wise is the steering box just sloppy.

 

[murf]

Chech the caster on an alignment machine. Next look at the front trackbar bushing. If the swaybar bushing are toast then the panhard bushing may also be gone. Other wise is the steering box just sloppy.

Another vote on checking the front panhard bushings too. Typical issue on 25 or old bushings and will cause the wandering you speak of.

 

[TWILLY]

Thanks guys. I appreciate all of the feedback. I will have the caster checked on an alignment machine on Tuesday, and will replace the panhard and sway bar bushings.

 

[TWILLY]

Looping back on this:

Caster was off. OME caster correction bushings installed. Panhard and sway bar bushings checked out, despite not looking nice.

With caster correction only, a huge improvement. No more tracking into road grooves absent steering input. Steering is now more stable, predictable, controllable, and is safer.

Good advice guys, thanks again.

 

[LongDuck]

We were just talking about this at the club meeting last night; caster correction bushings will improve the driving experience, but to get it a lot closer to stock geometry - you need plates. SLEE makes these and they're bolted alongside your stock arm mounts and rotate the pivots to where the axle is corrected instead of just the bushings (*you use stock bushings, then...). Steering accuracy and comfort is GREATLY improved when installed, and I've gone this incremental route over the past 7 years.

Now, with about 5k mi on the plates solution, the truck drives perfectly - except for one thing; you pick up a front U-joint whine due to pinion angle at the axle not matching the U-joint angle at the Transfer Case. This may or may not bother you, but you should expect it going in. All of us have experienced that whine and solutions range from DC front shafts to lowering the Transfer Case to help pinion angles to line up.

That said, I drove on caster correction bushings for many years, and if you don't know what you're missing, it'll feel good enough and a fair improvement over zero caster!

 

[TWILLY]

We were just talking about this at the club meeting last night; caster correction bushings will improve the driving experience, but to get it a lot closer to stock geometry - you need plates. SLEE makes these and they're bolted alongside your stock arm mounts and rotate the pivots to where the axle is corrected instead of just the bushings (*you use stock bushings, then...). Steering accuracy and comfort is GREATLY improved when installed, and I've gone this incremental route over the past 7 years.

Now, with about 5k mi on the plates solution, the truck drives perfectly - except for one thing; you pick up a front U-joint whine due to pinion angle at the axle not matching the U-joint angle at the Transfer Case. This may or may not bother you, but you should expect it going in. All of us have experienced that whine and solutions range from DC front shafts to lowering the Transfer Case to help pinion angles to line up.

That said, I drove on caster correction bushings for many years, and if you don't know what you're missing, it'll feel good enough and a fair improvement over zero caster!

Curious - how big of a lift are you running?

Interesting about the U joint and pinion angle. Perhaps relatedly, with the caster correction bushings installed, my shifting “clunk” disappeared entirely. Totally smooth now.