An off-center steering wheel is one of those little OCD things for me. If you have this problem, read on:
1) the following assumes you have a correct alignment and stock steering. If your truck is pulling to one side, wobbling, tramlining, or wearing tires oddly, correcting the steering wheel won’t fix anything. You need an alignment.
2) I’m working with a stock 99 LC. Pretty sure the 03+ are the same mechanically, but there’s some extra sensors you may need zero out. Maybe someone can comment. Lifts and custom suspension are also a wild card.
3) you’ll be working with a small bomb (aka airbag) and/or you can screw up your alignment if you’re not careful, so proceed with caution. It’s a 2
job.
The steering wheel is attached with a 36-point spline. So, each tooth represents 10°. Start with a protractor level across your steering wheel (iPhones have a good built-in one), and if you’re off by 10°, you’re in luck. Remove the airbag (CAREFULLY FOLLOW THE FSM) loosen the 19mm nut, and with the help of a loaner steering wheel puller from your friendly auto parts store, reposition the wheel by a tooth. Congratulations, you’re done. But, you should still measure your steering rack ends (as detailed below) to make sure that they have not been over-corrected.
If it’s not exactly 10°, you’ll need to adjust the steering tie rods. You’re going to screw one of them in and equally unscrew the other. The “equally” part is important, otherwise you throw off your toe settings (wheels pointing the same direction), which are part of your alignment. The below roughly follows the FSM process.
Tools you need:
- 20, 25, and 27mm open end wrenches
- blue painters tape and pen
- paint marker
- PB Blaster or other penetrant
- An accurate precision caliper
First, put a piece of tape down your steering column, draw a straight line down the length, and slit across the tape in the gap between the wheel and the column. Drive 100’ or so on a perfectly straight road and measure the offset. In my case below, it was between 4-6° (it’s a Land Cruiser, so not super precise)
1mm = about 1° of steering wheel angle according to the FSM, I’ll be correcting for 5° (the average of my measurements).
Do everything with the suspension loaded, wheels pointed ahead. Clean and soak the left and right tie rods in penetrant. The jam nut can be very hard to remove.
Clean everything and mark one of the lands on rack end, carefully noting where it is relative to the tie rod.
Remember that the tie rod rotates a few degrees on the ball joint, so find a landmark on the tie rod to correspond to your paint mark. In the pic above, my mark is at roughly the seam line of the casting. This is my fail-safe, in case I need to return to the original settings.
Next, measure the amount of exposed threaded rack end:
I used the distance between the tie rod and the groove for the rubber boot since these points are absolute. Measure both sides twice, carefully, and WRITE THE MEASUREMENTS DOWN or take pictures. You don’t want to lose track of these.
Toyota says there should not be more than 1.5mm difference between left and right. I’m not sure how critical this is, but mine came to 0.35mm.
So far you have only prepared and measured. Now, break the seal on the jam nut using the 25 and 27mm wrenches and ensure you can turn the end links in the tie rods. DON’T UNSCREW THEM, just make sure they’re not frozen by rotating them back and forth slightly, using your paint mark to return to the as-is state.
Remember your steering wheel tape measurement? One 360° turn of the threaded rack end translates to 12° of steering wheel angle per the FSM. The rack end has a hexagonal area for your 20mm wrench, so each of the 6 lands of the wrench area represents 2° of steering wheel angle. To correct for my 5°, I rotate about 2.5 lands. That’s what your paint mark is for. Do this equally on both sides PAYING CLOSE ATTENTION TO THE THREAD ORIENTATION, as they are opposite hand. You want to turn both wheels in the direction. If your steering wheel is too clockwise, you want your wheels turning more right, and vice versa.
Once you’re visually done by referencing your paint mark, re-check your measurements. If you did it right, one will now be greater than the other, but when added together, they will equal the sum of your starting measurements. THIS IS IMPORTANT. If your sum measurement is not the same, you have changed your toe angle, so fine tune the rack end.
Here is how I kept track:
so to correct for 5° in the steering wheel, the driver side rack end got 1mm shorter and the passenger side got 1mm longer. That was in fact about 2.5 lands. Yes, I exceeded the 1.5mm L/R difference between per the FSM, but I’m not sweating it. Technically, if I had started by overcorrecting at the steering wheel first, and then counter-correcting the over-correct at the tie rods, my difference may have been smaller.
However, if you’re measuring WAY different L/R, something likely is off with your steering rack and you should be working first at the steering wheel, then using the tie rods to fine tune anything less than 10°. Don’t make major adjustments at the tie rods, you want them as equal as possible.
Snug everything up (jam nut should be 41ft/lb), and take it for a straight test drive. In my case, I slightly over-corrected and had to back off half a land to get the steering wheel perfectly level. I taped up the jam nut joint tightly to keep it clean and easier to remove at the next alignment.
1) the following assumes you have a correct alignment and stock steering. If your truck is pulling to one side, wobbling, tramlining, or wearing tires oddly, correcting the steering wheel won’t fix anything. You need an alignment.
2) I’m working with a stock 99 LC. Pretty sure the 03+ are the same mechanically, but there’s some extra sensors you may need zero out. Maybe someone can comment. Lifts and custom suspension are also a wild card.
3) you’ll be working with a small bomb (aka airbag) and/or you can screw up your alignment if you’re not careful, so proceed with caution. It’s a 2
job.The steering wheel is attached with a 36-point spline. So, each tooth represents 10°. Start with a protractor level across your steering wheel (iPhones have a good built-in one), and if you’re off by 10°, you’re in luck. Remove the airbag (CAREFULLY FOLLOW THE FSM) loosen the 19mm nut, and with the help of a loaner steering wheel puller from your friendly auto parts store, reposition the wheel by a tooth. Congratulations, you’re done. But, you should still measure your steering rack ends (as detailed below) to make sure that they have not been over-corrected.
If it’s not exactly 10°, you’ll need to adjust the steering tie rods. You’re going to screw one of them in and equally unscrew the other. The “equally” part is important, otherwise you throw off your toe settings (wheels pointing the same direction), which are part of your alignment. The below roughly follows the FSM process.
Tools you need:
- 20, 25, and 27mm open end wrenches
- blue painters tape and pen
- paint marker
- PB Blaster or other penetrant
- An accurate precision caliper
First, put a piece of tape down your steering column, draw a straight line down the length, and slit across the tape in the gap between the wheel and the column. Drive 100’ or so on a perfectly straight road and measure the offset. In my case below, it was between 4-6° (it’s a Land Cruiser, so not super precise)
1mm = about 1° of steering wheel angle according to the FSM, I’ll be correcting for 5° (the average of my measurements).
Do everything with the suspension loaded, wheels pointed ahead. Clean and soak the left and right tie rods in penetrant. The jam nut can be very hard to remove.
Clean everything and mark one of the lands on rack end, carefully noting where it is relative to the tie rod.
Remember that the tie rod rotates a few degrees on the ball joint, so find a landmark on the tie rod to correspond to your paint mark. In the pic above, my mark is at roughly the seam line of the casting. This is my fail-safe, in case I need to return to the original settings.
Next, measure the amount of exposed threaded rack end:
I used the distance between the tie rod and the groove for the rubber boot since these points are absolute. Measure both sides twice, carefully, and WRITE THE MEASUREMENTS DOWN or take pictures. You don’t want to lose track of these.
Toyota says there should not be more than 1.5mm difference between left and right. I’m not sure how critical this is, but mine came to 0.35mm.
So far you have only prepared and measured. Now, break the seal on the jam nut using the 25 and 27mm wrenches and ensure you can turn the end links in the tie rods. DON’T UNSCREW THEM, just make sure they’re not frozen by rotating them back and forth slightly, using your paint mark to return to the as-is state.
Remember your steering wheel tape measurement? One 360° turn of the threaded rack end translates to 12° of steering wheel angle per the FSM. The rack end has a hexagonal area for your 20mm wrench, so each of the 6 lands of the wrench area represents 2° of steering wheel angle. To correct for my 5°, I rotate about 2.5 lands. That’s what your paint mark is for. Do this equally on both sides PAYING CLOSE ATTENTION TO THE THREAD ORIENTATION, as they are opposite hand. You want to turn both wheels in the direction. If your steering wheel is too clockwise, you want your wheels turning more right, and vice versa.
Once you’re visually done by referencing your paint mark, re-check your measurements. If you did it right, one will now be greater than the other, but when added together, they will equal the sum of your starting measurements. THIS IS IMPORTANT. If your sum measurement is not the same, you have changed your toe angle, so fine tune the rack end.
Here is how I kept track:
so to correct for 5° in the steering wheel, the driver side rack end got 1mm shorter and the passenger side got 1mm longer. That was in fact about 2.5 lands. Yes, I exceeded the 1.5mm L/R difference between per the FSM, but I’m not sweating it. Technically, if I had started by overcorrecting at the steering wheel first, and then counter-correcting the over-correct at the tie rods, my difference may have been smaller.
However, if you’re measuring WAY different L/R, something likely is off with your steering rack and you should be working first at the steering wheel, then using the tie rods to fine tune anything less than 10°. Don’t make major adjustments at the tie rods, you want them as equal as possible.
Snug everything up (jam nut should be 41ft/lb), and take it for a straight test drive. In my case, I slightly over-corrected and had to back off half a land to get the steering wheel perfectly level. I taped up the jam nut joint tightly to keep it clean and easier to remove at the next alignment.
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