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My steering wheel was off center by 20 deg when going straight. Instead of heading to shop, I decided to give it a try.
With the car on flat floor, set the steering wheel straight, turn off engine and move the car back and forth by a meter or so to take out any residual stress on the steering system.
Looking at the Haynes manual, one determines that the front wheel track is wider than the rear by 30 mm.
I tape a 3meter nylon corde to the centre of the rear wheel, than used a small piece of wood 30/2=15 mm thick and taped it between the corde and the rear tire ( to compensate for the aforementioned offset)
I ran the corde past the front tire by 1/2 meter and tied it to a stand so it passes through the centre of the front wheel too.
Now I could determine visually where the corde touches the front tire. When no toe is present, the corde should touch the front tire with no visible gap on each side of the front tire.
I had a huge TOE-IN (20mm on left and 10mm on right).
Now jack up the front tire, get underneath with a vise grip and a clef Anglaise and pray that the locknut on tie rod is not too rusted. A combinaison of unscrewing the steering axle and then the locknut will allow to set the toe to your satisfaction.
Remove the jack, check again and redo if needed.
Same procedure for the other side. I was shooting for Zero toe.
I tried the car. It worked very well.
Of course the tire are all the same, the pressure is set properly and no load in the car.
Now, where did I screw up ??
posted by 130.15.167...
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