Are there any tips to get my car to drive straight?

The 69 has a strong pull to the right when i let go of the wheel. Had it when i bought it, has it still after most of my new suspension package is on.

I marked the shims and replaced everything the way it was in that area. I'm hoping if i just adjust the tie rod ends more towards the right it will help the veer...

I don't know much about camber and caster or how i would go about measuring and adjusting them so i better leave those to a shop when i'm ready for that stage.

 

Caster is the angle that causes a car to pull. If the alignment has more than a half-degree caster spread, it will pull to the side with the least amount of caster.

First thing is to check the p/steering ram & make sure that it is not contributing. Or is there no power?

Next thing to check would be condition of the tires. To eliminate them as a prob, you simply rotate one SIDE at a time i.e. left front to left rear. Then drive it. If the pull is gone, then the defective tire is on the left rear (came from the front).

 

Thanks for the tips. Changing the tires around will be an easy thing to check if that's the problem.

How can i tell if the power steering ram is at fault?

If those turn out to be okay how do i go about adjusting the caster in the right direction?

 

Maybe this will help. http://www.carcraft.com/howto/48938/index.html

 

Can an off alignment case the car to drive that far off course?

I mean the second i let go of the wheel the car is going it's own right turn....almost 90degrees.

But i'll definitely give that home alignment website a looks over and attempt it tonight if I'm not working.

 

Believe it or not, you can do just as good of a job aligning your vette yourself, if not a better job than an alignment shop. I have heard you can put the same vette on an alignment rack ten times and get ten different fancy digital printouts. A vette needs to be driven around, then slowly driven straight ahead onto a completely flat surface and slowly stopped. Then and only then do you know the car is sitting undisturbed on it's suspension. We all know what happens to the geometry when we jack the rear end up. It takes a little driving to straighten everything out.

Old school guys can actually look at a car sitting flat and level, study the posture of the tires and tell you just about perfectly what needs to be done to correct the situation. My local vette shop has an alignment gauge that is more sophisticated than the carpenter level against the tire method shown above. It will read out what the camber and caster numbers are, as well as the corrections required. As far as toe-in and toe-out goes, place marks on a long stick to see how much difference there is between treads at the front of the front tires and at the rear of the front tires. Then adjust your tie rod sleeves accordingly while maintaining steering wheel center.

 

Sounds like PS valve.

 

I agree. How To:

http://www.mamotorworks.com/corvette...-320-3861.html

 

Looks like some very good information here that I can absorb and try to trouble shoot the problem.


I'll probably try and align or make sure the car is still aligned first. Then it looks like i'll be diving into the power steering pump.

Said the wheel may surge if the pump needs balancing. Is that while just sitting after you start the car? or is that while driving i wonder.

 

Doubt this is it, but my brake was stuck, pulled real bad, didnt feel like it was stuck. Then one day was cruising, there was just a ton of smoke pouring out of the wheel well. Replaced lines.

 

You may or may not need an alignment.
The power steering pump is on the front of your motor,
the control valve is under the front of the car and that is what might need to be balanced.

 

Well i didn't have a whole lot of time tonight to work on it but i swapped wheels front to back on the passenger side and that did nothing.

I then measured the lengths of the tie rod ends from zirk to zirk. One side was 1in off compared to the other. So I evened them out and took it for a spin which seemed to reduce the severity of the pull to the right.


I put the level to the wheels and for the most part the camber was petty close.

Not sure how i measure caster yet as the website didn't really specify that. And if so at what point do i want it? All they say is adjust for more/less positive/negative caster....

I'll get the toe in correct tomorrow as well as look into the power steering valve balancing.

 

Okay. Things i did today and plan to do.


I set the toe in to the proper position. It was about 2inches off the way it was.

I also gave the right tire more positive caster. It had 2 shims at the forward bolt and I moved them to the rear. Didn't have any extra shims just yet so...

None of that helped at all and right now i feel like the car has perfect toe-in, good camber, and most likely okay caster.

I'm heading out to work on adjusting the power steering pump.

 

FIXED!!!

Turned out to be the power steering balance nut. It wasn't far off but enough to make it veer in that direction.



It still wanders left or right slightly but i have a feeling that's more to do with me not being able to align it just right yet, as well as possible out of balance tires.

 

 

Now here is some additional info for your alignment:

http://duntovmotors.com/AlignmentSchool.htm

Hope everything works out great. -Jeff
BTW, we know that in paragraph 8 the website guy misspelled toe as tow, our new website will be up soon. lol.