Now that I have my MINi back on the road after a seized bearing fiasco, I've noticed another issue.

As I pull out of my driveway, I crank the wheel to the right. Going down the road to go straight I need to go about 15 degrees past straight to the left to get the car to track straight. Sounds like a simple alignment issue right?

Well, when I turn left I realize that I now have to turn the wheel the same amount to the right now to track the car straight. Not just for a short distance, I mean until I turn again.

If the car is stopped, I can straighten the wheels up by turning the opposite way and then with the play in the wheel get the car tracking true.

Any ideas?

 

Yeah, weird symptom to say the least. Don't be offended by my suggestions here, I'm just brainstorming on what things might cause that problem.

Just for a sanity check, here's the first things I would check:
* front wheel bearings and brakes are not dragging
* with both front wheels off the ground, confirm the steering rack travels from left to right lock and back to left without any issues.

Other unlikely candidates but I'll just throw them out here:
* You don't, by chance, have negative front caster do you? That would certainly play havoc with the ability for the car to track straight. I don't even know if you can attain negative caster on these cars.
* I assume your steering rack doesn't have 30 degrees of free play, but I thought I would bring that up just to throw it in the pot here.

I would also do a quick front alignment toe measurement with a tape measure ... it should be about 1/16" to 1/8" toe out.

Once you over correct by 15 degrees, can you let go of the wheel and have the car track straight, or does it pull to one side as soon as you let go of the wheel?

 

Good questions as always. Thanks.

1) I am 99.9% sure the left front bearing is in properly and the brake is not dragging. I did not take apart the right side, I should do that and see if it wasn't installed properly

2) Will jack it up and confirm right to left lock without issues.


3) not sure which way is negative caster, but I believe (the left) the two ball joints are on top of each other, not angled from one another. Will check both sides

4) No there isn't that much play in it

5) Toe out means the front of the tires are away from each other by that amount, right?

Yes, the car tracks straight (given the road, etc) with my hands off even if the wheel is angled. Could it be looseness in the steering tierods perhaps? The left locking not couldn't seat itself all the way down. I add 2 locking washers so I could get it nice and snug...

 

I would only take apart the RHS if you suspect there's a problem. First, just get the wheel off the ground, trans in neutral, and spin the wheel. If it feels the same as the LHS, leave it.

Positive caster is when the top ball joint is behind (front to rear) the bottom ball joint. Negative caster is when the top ball joint is ahead of the bottom ball joint. Positive caster will force the steering to auto-center when driving forward. Negative caster will force the steering to auto-center when driving reverse. I seriously doubt you have changed the caster (can be changed with the suspension alignment) if you didn't adjust anything when you had it apart.

Toe out means the tires are farther apart at the front than they are at the rear of the front wheels. Rear wheel drive cars typically have a small amount of toe in, front wheel drive cars (at least these) have a small amount of toe out.

With both front tires off the ground (ie front end on jack stands) turn the steering wheel back and forth in short strokes. If you can move the steering wheel without the wheels moving then you likely have play in either your tie rods or steering rack, or both. Easy to check. I would do that first, as that's the most likely culprit. If you can get a second person to help, have them move the steering wheel back and forth as you're watching the steering parts - you'll find the problem right away.

 

Just reporting back on this. Once I got the car up, I see a lot of play in the steering system. Based on what I could see and hear the left tie rod end was worn. The lock nut was free spinning and there was play there. I ordered new ones and will be installing shortly. We'll see if that fixes

 

you will defo need to have your tracking corrected after changing steering rack swivel joints.................

 

I installed a steering column drop bracket on my Mini this weekend. With the steering rack u-bolts loose I noticed that the rack would move side to side when turning the wheel. Since that could definitely produce the same behavior, I would also confirm that the steering rack is solidly mounted and isn't sliding side-to-side. That would certainly contribute to sloppy steering.

Jeff

 

Thanks, Jeff. Good to know. I have a drop bracket as well that I have yet to install. So I'll do that and see if things were loose. That could save me from doing the tie rod ends right now and could do that more at my leisure.