Need Help adjusting crooked steering wheel

Hello i am new to Tacoma world . signed up because i always came across it when searching up help on my Tacoma . I have a 1999 2wd prerunner & i never really got to work on it myself yet . but this past weekend ny bro in law helped me replace my drivers upper ball joint & lower control arm bushings . wen starting the job i forgot to lock my steering wheel & when we put everything back on my steering wheel is totally sideways !! can anyone tell me how i can readjust it ? do i have to remove the steering rack bolts agen to readjust ? please lmk , sorry im not a pro diyer ! im actually just trying to get into it so i can save some money by doing my own repairs . thanks in advance !

 

Follow the steering shaft down to where it mates up with the steering rack itself. Unbolt it, and get your steering wheel straight, and rebolt it. This will get it close. If you want it dead on, do that and then get an alignment.

 

There should be a link on the steering shaft that goes into the rack and pinion that can be loosened or undone and adjusted. I would also suggest an alignment asap

 

We are on top of it tonight.

 

Awesome !! thanks guys I was searching on youtube for 2 days now but could not find a simple explanation

 

Welcome aboard new member

 

Something does not add up.
Did you remove tie rod ends? What you said you did should not affect the steering.

For what it's worth, removing that knuckle to adjust the steering wheel is a pain.

I think your problem is elsewhere.

You are most likely going to need an alignment.

 

I'm in agreement, why was the steering rack removed for ball joints/LCA bushings? Unless you did the rack bushings too?

@Moses808 If you put something back together and it was tweaked check that first. otherwise next time mark where you take bolts out

 

I second that, steering wheel shouldn’t be crooked unless the tie rods or rack itself was messed with. Ball joints and control arm bushings have no bearing on the alignment/steering wheel angle. It’s possible the bushings were so worn it was affecting the alignment and then when you replaced with new bushings the steering wheel was slightly crooked, but this shouldn’t be a huge difference. I’m not even sure how noticeable it would be.

 

@Black DOG Lila thanks !

 

@frizzman i did not remove the rack all the way off , however i had to remove some bolts from it so that i cud lift it just enough to get the rear lca camber bolt out .

 

@koditten i only removed the tie rod from the knuckle . i didnt remove it off of the steering rack .

 

Have you driven the truck since you worked on it? Does it drive the same?

Can you park the truck with the SW in the proper position? Walk twenty feet in front of the truck and look at the front tires. If that SW is off as much as you say, you should be able to see if the wheeles are not pointing straight.

I can't figure out what you did to make that SW crooked. Color me confused.

 

I agree that it sounds like the work you did shouldn't have impacted the steering wheel alignment. There's another way to resolve this that doesn't involve messing with the rag joint.

Turn the wheel all the way to the left until it locks. Then turn the wheel to the right until it locks, counting the number of rotations. Divide that number by two, then turn the wheel that many times to the left. Remove the steering wheel, align it properly, and then reattach.

I had to do this procedure after doing some steering rack work. Removing the steering wheel is really pretty easy, can be done in a couple minutes.

 

^^^^^This. You need to make sure steering wheel in center = steering rack in center.

Ideally you should also have equal length (or at least Real World Close) tie rod length.

 

Go get it aligned.

You moved the LCA cam adjusters to put in new bushings, and moved the steering rack.

Before you do that, though, is there a reason you only did one side of your bushings/balljoints?

That kind of stuff is like headlights. If you replace one, you might as well replace both sides.

 

WOW! There is some absolutely atrocious suggestions and or problem solving on this thread!! LOL Jesus! OP... the ALIGNMENT CAMS are off now... All these people telling you that your steering can't be off are incorrect. If you didn't put the alignment cams back to where they were previously your steering is going to be off now. You will need to adjust the tie rods now. You should go get an alignment because the problem is the lower arms need to be set correct first then the tie rods are adjusted after that. Adjusting the tie rods now to compensate and you're literally going in circles now...

 

Incorrect! The cam alignment tabs are the VARIABLE. The steering wheel is off now because OP didn't put the cam tabs back to exactly how they were. The cam alignment tabs pry have approximately half an inch of play so the lower arm is not in the same orientation OP had it previously. OP would now need to adjust tie rod to compensate however that would be the incorrect procedure because the lower arms AKA CAM ALIGNMENT TABS need to be set correctly first then tie rods are adjusted after that. At this point OP needs an alignment. Unbolting the tie rods from knuckle and removing steering rack bolts are irrelevant.

 

I think the important piece of info were missing here is how crooked is the steering wheel? Yes you are correct alignment cams will have a slight impact on the steering wheel angle, but OP made it sound like it was a pretty significantly off. But yeah again if the cams are way off from how they were coupled with worn LCA bushings I suppose that could be compounded into a pretty noticeable difference.