After alignment truck drives straight, but steering wheel slightly tiled?

I can try to post pics of the alignment sheet and steering wheel, but i noticed that my truck drives straight, but the steering wheel is slightly tilted one way... in a perfect world the steering wheel should be striaght. but now when its straight, the truck will turn to the right. Again, if i let my hand off the wheel, the truck will drive relatively straight, but the steering wheel isnt.

Any idea whats causing this?

 

The steering wheel should get "locked" down when tie-rods are adjusted.. sounds like they got everything nice and straight down at the wheels but the steering wheel is simply off in relation to the toe angle.
Alignment accuracy is helped greatly by use of a machine but its still up to the technician and his attention to detail. Its not an exact science

Up to you if you wanna live with it or get another alignment

 

1st gens are known for a bit of steering slack due to the rack bushings.

So the tech will set the alignment and it will be perfect, but the wear in the bushings will result in the wheel not being perfectly true.

I've watched many techs bring alignments back in just to see its set perfectly, but the wheel is crooked.

Easiest way to check is to have someone rock the steering wheel and watch the steering rack to see how much it moves.

 

Like Bishop stated….if lots of play could be worn bushes
or
Tech did not clamp steering wheel to brake pedal or use the tool that looks like an old Club anti theft device

other option BESIDES returning to align shop……
Take off steering wheel and move up/down 1-2 column splines
Not that difficult
No need to remove clock spring

Just make sure your neg batt terminal off b4 work
Make sure upon installation that arrows on clock spring didn’t move when u removed airbag/steering wheel. Arrows should line up when installing SW

 

Take it back to the alignment shop. A straight wheel is part of the whole job and they will fix it free of charge.

 

i had a strange suspicion that they didnt adjust the tie rods because my old marks from an old alignemnt were still painted on there and didnt see new paint marks

 

the alignment was like 5 ish months ago, not sure if they would honor it. even tho it was always like this after the alignment, i just remembered now and decided to make this thread

 

Same happened to me on two 1st gen’s. I was not happy but then realized the problem. It’s the steering shaft slop in the slip joint. Check your wheel for slop. Grab the shaft down by the firewall and move wheel slightly left and right. If you have slop then they can’t get the wheel straight unless they get lucky. Simple weld trick to fix it. I did both of mine then got alignment again and all good. Straight wheel. No slop. Very happy.

 

Your problem is how the rag joint/intermediate shaft joint (connection for the steering wheel to the steering rack) meets the top of the steering rack. Certainly doesn’t sound like it’s slop in the steering but the steering wheel being off center.

Park the truck, get your wheels as close to straight as possible, loosen the bolt holding the rag joint to the steering rack and slip it upward away from the steering rack (making it so movement of the steering wheel doesn’t engage the steering rack), then turn the steering wheel to dead center, reconnect the rag joint (which now turned ever slightly) to the steering rack and you’re done. I had to do this after replacing my steering rack and getting an alignment.

See where Adventure Taco discusses the rag slip joint. Step #2.

https://adventuretaco.com/guide/replacing-the-steering-rack-on-a-1st-gen-tacoma-or-3rd-gen-4runner/Step-by-Step: Replacing the Steering Rack on a 1st Gen Tacoma (or 3rd Gen 4Runner) – AdventureTaco

 

They should have done this at alignment, but there's no need to disassemble the rag joint for a fix. They can easily adjust this out at the tie rods, one side will have a thread or two more than the other but it will straighten the wheel.

Now if it's pulling to one side that's an different matter.

 

how does this look?

 

They NEVER get the wheel straight, in my experience. I learned here in TW, to adjust the tie rods equally, in small increments, as follows: to move the wheel to center when it's tilted left, turn the tie rod adjusters equally towards the driver side. If the wheel is tilted towards the right, do it towards the passenger side. I do this myself now with two monkey wrenches, moving those adjusters 1/4 turn at a time and making sure they are always equal moves on both sides, as I don't want to get lost on that. It worked perfectly.
A lot of times, the tech will tend to align the wheel with the stalks (directionals/wipers) which are slightly off-center-left, which makes your wheel the same. I've concluded this, as my wheel is always slightly off to left after every alignment I get, and the wheel is perfectly lined with the stalks! True straight, to my eyes, lines up with the straight-lined bottom of the instrument cluster pod. Hope this helps you.

 

thanks!

 

A friend of mine had his car alignment fixed years ago, and I drove it right after, only to find the same issue. Took it back to the shop and they admitted they forgot to fix that and had it adjusted back to normal before long.

 

Are you adjusting the tie rods themselves or, put differently, what are the tie rods adjusters? I’d like to govern this a try…. Thx.

 

There are two nuts where the outer tie rod meets the inner tie rod. One is a lock nut and the other is for adjusting. Free up the lock nut and turn the adjusting nut to either shorten the outer tie rod or lengthen the outer tie rod.