Hey everybody, just bought a 1979 242 GT and it's got a hard pull to the left. I just put on new tires, tie rods are fine, had the alignment checked and it's good. The shop says it's the power steering rack. Wondering if anyone else has had this problem before? Hoping I don't need to drop $900 to get it fixed, but if I have to...

 

Hm... if it's not alignment issue and it really is pretty noticeable it could be the steering rack. I'm not pro by any means, but i can't think of what else may cause it.

 

I would check the balljoints, maybe the car has two left or two right ones.....instead of one of each.

 

Ball joints WILL NOT cause your car to pull one way or the other and usually a bad rack will not either it will just make it harder to turn. I think it may be a sticky front caliper(car is old may be rusted and stuck)...have your brakes checked. If your rack is bad you will usually feel it really hard to turn one way and easy to the other or hard both ways. To test, while car is running and in park, turn your wheel to the left, then to the right does one feels harder than the other? Typically things that can cause a pull from most likely to least likely are 1.poor alignment 2.bent control arms 3.bad tires 4.sticky front brake calipers 4.bent tie rods

 

Also,a 240 can only have 1 ball joint per side and you cannot put a left on the right side and vice versa...at least I have never seen it done and I have worked on hundreds of 240's...

 

So I've had the alignment checked and its good, the brakes are fine, and tie-rods are fine. New tires on the front and when I turn the wheel with the engine running in park it is harder to go right than left. Probably the rack then, huh. Dammit. Thanks for the replies.

 

The 240 that my roommate just gave to me pulls to the left and we know why, the steering rack has a bad seal somewhere (it is a power steering rack) that's really the only problem that could cause what it does, the steering wheel will turn to the left even when the car is not moving. When you start the car the steering wheel will turn half a turn to the left, and stepping on the gas causes it to turn more. I'm pretty sure that if that doesn't happen to you then you don't have the same problem.

I could probably fix it if I tried but if I find a 240 at the junkyard with manual steering (I've seen two so far) then my station wagon is getting a manual steering downgrade. Cars that enter my possession always have less features when I'm done with them.

 

yep...bad rack. You can get a beautiful rebuilt rack on Ebay for $150!! You just send your old rack back as a core and the guy sends you a rebuilt like new for $150. You ned to find out what kind of rack you have but most likely it's a cam..good luck...btw no 240's that I know of ever came with no power steering so if you saw a car in the yard it was retrofitted or they just pulled the power steering motor out...the really old Volvo's like 122's, PV544's did not come with power sterring...

 

Sorry to revive an old thread, but both my service manuals for the 240 have instructions for rebuilding manual steering racks. They may not have sold a lot of them, but I'm pretty sure they made them.

 

I just got an '89 245 with pretty much the same symptoms. While reading through my Haynes, 3 different Chiltons, and my Bentley manual, I ran across the following in one of the Chiltons under "Troubleshooting the Power Steering Gear" :

Problem: Car pulls to one side or the other..

Cause: Front end misaligned ORUnbalanced steering gear valve. NOTE: If this is the cause, steering effort will be very light in direction of pull and normal or heavier in opposite direction.

None of the manuals really tell you how to correct this, so I'm thinking it may be time for a new rack. They don't look like a big deal to change, and I'm thinking $900 sounds awfully high...

 

Issue solved...So while putting off replacing the entire steering rack I found a mechanic who works strictly on Volvos, trained by Volvo Inc. I called him to ask about the pull to the left and he told me that it was an unbalanced steering gear valve (as mentioned by Joseph/TX). I brought it in to him and he had it fixed for $80...sweet. My Haynes manual says absolutely nothing about this, and I couldn't find anything online. I'm not sure how to do it, but I'm sure glad I didn't spring for that rack.

 

I love happy endings! Thanks for reporting back. My 740 is my daily driver; the 240 with the steering problem is sort of a project, so I can afford to spend a little time doing some more research on the repair/adjustment of this problem valve. $80 beats $900, or even $150, every time.