Steering Wheel alignment

[blklnamru]

To give a back story... last week a purchased a set of HK Dynapro ATM's (275/65/18) and have really liked them so far, as quietness, ride quality and grip is concerned. Unrelated, I also pulled the battery this weekend to clean the terminals, engine bay etc (in process hood fell twice on my head - ordering a new set of struts).

Last night as I pulled out of driveway and drove down the street, noticed that my steering wheel was aiming left ~20degrees while car tracked straight. I pulled over immediately and did an exterior check. Both front were point straight and it was just the SW which was out of whack. I also checked for leaking liquids. Nothing. Did a full left and right lock and visually checked wheels. Everything looked okay. Drove a few more feet and steering wheel was still off. I really needed to haul some items back, and decided to just keep going. Got to the first light about a mile down from the house and noticed that both the car and SW were tracking straight. Did a full lock left/right and visually inspected. All looked good. Car was fine the remainder of the 100mile roundtrip. Really odd I thought. Has this happened to anyone else, or does anyone know why this happened?

I'm wondering if it was possibly due to tires (probably not), something lose or leaking (have no idea what though), or because of the battery being pulled (most likely but I have no idea why)

Additionally, when I pulled the battery the steering wheel was straight.

 

[blklnamru]

... Steering wheel alignment wow, VGRS. So it auto realigned? I need to do more research on this. Apologies for the thread & I can't seem to figure out how to delete.

 

[nnnnnate]

Guessing you've got a 03+ LX? You can reset the SW via techstream without much trouble. The electronic gears unlock and you move the wheel to the right position before locking the gears back up. Are you getting any lights on your dash?

The incorrect method to fixing this is to pull the steering wheel and rotate just the wheel back to center. This will cause your spiral spring to break. Don't ask how I know, also don't ask how I know the $12 replacement from Amazon will seem like it works but in the end doesn't.

I had to replace my VGRS ECU earlier this year because despite all my best efforts the wheel kept going off center. Everything was great for a few months then I went wheeling and did what you do while wheeling and now its back off just a smidgen. It'd be easy enough to fix but my LX got burgled and now I'm without my techstream netbook and I haven't managed to get it going on another computer yet.

Good luck.