mrCharlie Posted March 3, 2007 Share Posted March 3, 2007 99 Legacy GT 5MT, 176k, former rust-belt car. Earlier this week I had the steering rack replaced. The steering essentially had a 1-2" dead spot off center, low resistance and little reaction. The dead spot has been there since I bought the car. The car also felt sloppy in corners and would wander left and right on straight highway, and the dead spot required pretty big wheel movements to correct it. Hitting bumps, even squarely, would almost jerk the wheel from my hands. The person I bought it from included a junkyard rack with the car, which is the rack I had installed. He previously replaced the "steering knuckles" which I assume meant the universal joints in the column. My mechanic tightened some bolts on the u-joints, and fought with a lot of rusty bolts, but eventually got the rack installed. I then had it aligned. The steering is now very tight. Its comfortably heavy, at least in my opinion- right where I like it. The car responds to the smallest of wheel movements. However, additional problems have shown up in the days after the rack was replaced. These may have been present all along, but the dead spot in the steering could have been masking them. Most of my trouble has to do with vibration. I used to have a little vibration on a cold morning which seemed to go away when the car warmed up. Now it is ever-present and shakes the wheel constantly as I go down the highway. It's pretty mild up to about 55-60mph, and then gets very bad as speeds go up. The car tracks straight, but If I let the wheel go the car quickly drifts left or right. Tramlining is mild but I did find one bad section of highway that upset it. It also seems throttle sensitive- the vibration lessens when I'm on the throttle. If I let off the throttle, especially at highway speeds, the vibrations worsen. If I hit the brakes (pads/rotors 10k/6mo ago) it gets much worse. It used to stop so strong and true, now it's almost scary. Its weird, because it seems like the steering remains heavy but the car feels like its floating while I stop. First thing I will check is wheel balance by rotating tires and seeing if anything changes. After that, from what I've read here, I'm leaning toward dead control arm bushings. This car has seen a lot of salt and it seems to have been driven hard, and our brick streets can't be easy on suspension parts. I'll crawl under there this weekend and see how they look, and maybe have my wife help me with the parking lot test. Any suggestions from those more wise than I on what it could be, or what I should look for? I will probably be taking to my mechanic for the actual work, but I'd like some thoughts first. Could there have been something messed up installing the rack or doing the alignment? If it is the bushings, am I better off just buying new arms which have the bushings already installed? The price difference doesn't seem to be too much. Thanks in advance! <-- (how my steering wheel looks right now ) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
porcupine73 Posted March 3, 2007 Share Posted March 3, 2007 doing the alignment?Was an alignment done? I'd say it is required, considering the tie rod ends. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted March 3, 2007 Share Posted March 3, 2007 Th steering knucle"s" are not the universal in the column. The knuckles are on the parts that hold the wheel bearings. You dont replace them generally, you just replace the wheel bearings. There are a few possibilities here 1- broken belts in the tires 2- out of balance tires 3- bad wheel bearings 4- Bad universal joint in the driveshaft 5- Bad carrier bearing (same place as above). And as stated above, it needs an alighnment. nipper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tcspeer Posted March 3, 2007 Share Posted March 3, 2007 If you are talking about the big control arm bushing at the rear of the control arm they will leak grease when they go bad, and a pop or clunk will be heard when you turn the car around. If that shaking is much worse when you brake I would change the rotors. I would think the tires may be the rest of the problem on that shaking if the other rack was as bad as you say the tires probably have a bad wear patten on them and the firm rack is not letting them roll to the old wear patten. 99 Legacy GT 5MT, 176k, former rust-belt car. Earlier this week I had the steering rack replaced. The steering essentially had a 1-2" dead spot off center, low resistance and little reaction. The dead spot has been there since I bought the car. The car also felt sloppy in corners and would wander left and right on straight highway, and the dead spot required pretty big wheel movements to correct it. Hitting bumps, even squarely, would almost jerk the wheel from my hands. The person I bought it from included a junkyard rack with the car, which is the rack I had installed. He previously replaced the "steering knuckles" which I assume meant the universal joints in the column. My mechanic tightened some bolts on the u-joints, and fought with a lot of rusty bolts, but eventually got the rack installed. I then had it aligned. The steering is now very tight. Its comfortably heavy, at least in my opinion- right where I like it. The car responds to the smallest of wheel movements. However, additional problems have shown up in the days after the rack was replaced. These may have been present all along, but the dead spot in the steering could have been masking them. Most of my trouble has to do with vibration. I used to have a little vibration on a cold morning which seemed to go away when the car warmed up. Now it is ever-present and shakes the wheel constantly as I go down the highway. It's pretty mild up to about 55-60mph, and then gets very bad as speeds go up. The car tracks straight, but If I let the wheel go the car quickly drifts left or right. Tramlining is mild but I did find one bad section of highway that upset it. It also seems throttle sensitive- the vibration lessens when I'm on the throttle. If I let off the throttle, especially at highway speeds, the vibrations worsen. If I hit the brakes (pads/rotors 10k/6mo ago) it gets much worse. It used to stop so strong and true, now it's almost scary. Its weird, because it seems like the steering remains heavy but the car feels like its floating while I stop. First thing I will check is wheel balance by rotating tires and seeing if anything changes. After that, from what I've read here, I'm leaning toward dead control arm bushings. This car has seen a lot of salt and it seems to have been driven hard, and our brick streets can't be easy on suspension parts. I'll crawl under there this weekend and see how they look, and maybe have my wife help me with the parking lot test. Any suggestions from those more wise than I on what it could be, or what I should look for? I will probably be taking to my mechanic for the actual work, but I'd like some thoughts first. Could there have been something messed up installing the rack or doing the alignment? If it is the bushings, am I better off just buying new arms which have the bushings already installed? The price difference doesn't seem to be too much. Thanks in advance! <-- (how my steering wheel looks right now ) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted March 3, 2007 Share Posted March 3, 2007 If you are talking about the big control arm bushing at the rear of the control arm they will leak grease when they go bad, and a pop or clunk will be heard when you turn the car around. If that shaking is much worse when you brake I would change the rotors. I would think the tires may be the rest of the problem on that shaking if the other rack was as bad as you say the tires probably have a bad wear patten on them and the firm rack is not letting them roll to the old wear patten. Easy thing to do is to rotate the tires and see what happens. nipper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tcspeer Posted March 3, 2007 Share Posted March 3, 2007 If the back ones are good that should work, maybe the other owner did not rotate them and he will be able to tell. If they have ever been on the front they might also have the same wear patten. Easy thing to do is to rotate the tires and see what happens. nipper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted March 3, 2007 Share Posted March 3, 2007 If he just got this, and the previous owner replaced the steering knuckles (unheard of).... he better check his tires anyway. Make sure they all match so he doesnt chew up the AWD system. nipper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrCharlie Posted March 3, 2007 Author Share Posted March 3, 2007 Rack was installed by small indie Subaru shop. Alignment was done at Firestone (mechanic's recommendation) the same day the rack was finished. I've had the car about one year. I bought the tires (Toyo Proxes 4) right after I got the car, so they have 20k miles/just under 1 year on them. I did a front/back rotation 6k/4-5 months ago, which at the time took some vibration out of the steering. They had a lot of miles up front, so that would make some sense about wear problems with the slop in the rack. Firestone did a courtesy check and measured the tires from 4/32-6/32. When I bought the tires, I did not have an alignment done as I planned to have the rack done right after that- but money and priorities delayed it until now. Additionally, one of the fronts was patched and rebalanced last month (screw dead center in the tread). The way the previous owner described the knuckles is more consistent with the parts that hold the wheel bearings. I've since learned the previous owner likes to buy run down Subarus, repair them, then sell them- so it is entirely possible he did replace them. He said there was a clunk in the steering and it needed a rack, but I can't say I ever felt it-just the dead band. The mechanic felt like the universal in the column was okay after he tightened it, and he thought everything else seemed okay. He also may not have taken to the highway, and it does feel fine around town. This is sounding more and more like the tires could be part of the problem, but I'm not fully convinced that they are the only problem. The rotors are pretty new (10k/6 mo) but I won't say they aren't part of the problem. What does strike me as odd is the "floatiness" I feel when I brake-almost like the car wants to rock forward. I've also had tires w/broken belts before and know they car be just plain weird. I'll try rotating and see if there is ANY change in the way it acts. Think I'll have the mechanic look it over too before I invest in more tires (thinking Michelin Pilot Exaltos this time, $500 installed at Costco). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted March 3, 2007 Share Posted March 3, 2007 How are the struts? nipper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hankosolder2 Posted March 3, 2007 Share Posted March 3, 2007 If he just got this, and the previous owner replaced the steering knuckles (unheard of).... he better check his tires anyway. Make sure they all match so he doesnt chew up the AWD system. nipper Nipper, I don't think replacing steering knuckles is particularly unusual on a rustbelt subaru... if the design on this car is the same as a '94 Legacy (and I'm pretty sure it is) the lower ball joint taper pin is clamped by the steering knuckle (there's a split part on the bottom which crushes the taper pin) with a smallish bolt (12mm? 13mm)? going into female threads in the steering knuckle-- this bolt gets very corroded and is easy to shear off. Ah, yes, very easy indeed! At that point, you may have to have a machine shop use one of those spark erosion devices to extract the stub of bolt, replace the wheel bearing, etc. Or just install a complete junkyard steering knuckle. I agree with the original poster that the play in the rack may have masked some of the vibration, but I wonder if his mechanic somehow managed to warp the rotors by overtorquing lug nuts? Nathan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrCharlie Posted March 12, 2007 Author Share Posted March 12, 2007 Quick update... Today I finally got around to rotating the tires. Looks like the front tires have been causing the shaking problem. The front tires have been up front for about 6000 miles, and were in the back for the first 14,000 of their life. A few months ago one of the fronts ended up with a screw in it, which required getting it patched. So, I'm not sure if they died from wearing poorly up front, or from the screw and patch. Either way, I've ordered a set of Michelin Pilot Exalto A/S from Costco which should be in soon enough. At least a dying tire in the back seems a little safer than in the front, and it doesn't kill my hands. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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