Need help on front end

Purchased a 95 tacoma last year for my son's first truck. We changed the rack and pinion which came with inner tie rod ends and we replaced outer tie rod ends. He has horrible turning radius and when he is turning the tie rod end is catching the tire and stopping the truck from rolling all together. Took it for an alignment and the tech said we put the rack in backwards. Any ideas on where we went wrong? We have been struggling to get it fixed for a year now. He turns 16 in 10 days and I'd love for it to be drivable before then. Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

Welcome to TW Sam. Couple of first impressions...

Where is the castle nut and cotter pin for that outer tie rod?



CV Boot is torn. Going to need to address that.



Can you provide more pics of the steering rack? Perhaps from a bit further back?

What else did the tech mention? You can't install it 'backwards'. Need to see more of the issue. Left side, center, right side - more details.

Now granted this is from a 2002-2004 so there might be slight changes on the 95.

 

I think if anything your Outer tie rods are on the wrong side.The tie rods are wrong for the application.

I can not figure out how a steering rack could be installed wrong nothing would come close to lining up.

Outer tie rods on the wrong side would give a less experienced front end tech the impression the steering rack is on back wards

This is a easy mistake to make on your first rack swap.

Look at things I bet that swapping them fixes the problem if they are the correct outer tie rods.

Good Luck!

 

The tie rod ends we purchased from autozone came with locking nuts instead of castle nuts.
Yes, cv axles are next on our list.
The tech only told us it was on backwards and for an extra $600 he could fix it.

 

Steering rack is correct (position) - where did you get that rack? Tech was trying to make an easy 600 bones.

Outer tie rods are incorrect. Notice the bend, needs to be correct. As for them not coming with castle nuts, yeah that is a new one on me. Personally, I say order OEM from your local parts department and return those things.

 

Outer tie rods need to be swapped from one side to the other. The offset in the tie rod goes to the front of the vehicle. Not the rear. That's why the wheel is making contact.

 

We just switched the tie rod ends so they should curve towards the front or the rear of the vehicle? They were curving towards the back and he just switched them to go towards the front. We purchased the rack from ebay honestly. I confirmed it fit the truck before the purchase also.

 

I wish that shop was close I would love to visit.

I have a Female State Police Trooper friend who loves to play the dumb blonde.

Who could talk Muscle Cars with the Best of them.

 

Now go find another alignment shop and should be good to go

:EDIT:
I would still get rid of those lock nuts... yikes!

 

We only have autozone and oriley locally. We got the tie rod ends from autozone.

 

Big o tires at its finest.

 

Would an alignment fix the turning radius? He only gets 3/4 turn to the left and 1 1/2 to the right. Can't even do a full u-turn in it.

 

The tie rods are not even close to being correct .

a good shop can fix this .

it will destroy the tires if not done soon.

 

Not driving it until it is finished. Should the cv axels be replaced prior to alignment? We have a few other things we have to fix on it as well. The cluster panel is next after the cv axels.

 

Being your first time no big deal.

It is easy to get things close comparing it with the rack you removed by measuring the threads on both sides and adjust according .

some of the outer tie rods no longer even have the holes drilled for cotter pins. .

Another cost saving feature.

 

May as well get everything finished .

 

Thank you for all your help.

 

Ok so switched the tie rod ends and it was hitting worse. We are so frustrated.

 

Do you still have the old rack and outer tie rods?

 

No. We replaced them over a year ago.