Advice sought: feeling a grind/vibration upon steering left

This may be a dumb or newbie question but I'm a little puzzled here.

So I got a 2008 TRD Sport and drove it home the other day. It was a total of 2 days drive from Alberta back to BC, through the Rockies, in winter. In total drove the truck for about 15 hours over 2 days.

When I was 3 hours away from home I noticed that upon steering left, like when changing lanes, I felt a slight vibration in the steering wheel as soon as I turned it - including small leftward adjustments. It feels as if something is grinding into something when I turn the wheel.

It's slight, but noticeable especially at higher speeds. It's completely absent when steering right. Upon parking at home after a full day of driving I could smell a sort of burning/overheating smell - you know the smell from the brakes on semis when they're on long downhill stretches? Like that.

Anyone have any ideas of what could be causing it? The driver side front wheel was removed for the inspection which didn't reveal anything wrong with the truck. I'm slightly worried and any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

 

Welcome to TW OP.

 

Hey now....I need something to do with you guys answering all the easy ones already.

Ive been trolling all day due to work shortages.... maybe you two can take tomorrow and Friday off since I have nothing to do those days?

 

Wow, so many replies in an hour. Thanks guys!

Another piece of background I forgot to mention that now makes sense reading the above: on Monday night I was driving from Calgary to Golden, the weather was shit, the road was shit, it was dark and snow was blowing everywhere - I hit this ridge in the road, some large crack due to construction or maintenance or something.

It banged the left front wheel pretty hard. Didn't blow out the tire thankfully, but i can see how it could cause a dent or bend in some of the bearing or caliper parts causing this.

In a way I feel relieved cause at least it's not some hidden defect in the steering column which would probably be really expensive to fix.

Thanks for the welcome and the advice guys!