Hey all,

First post but have been reading a bit on this forum. I just picked up a 89 240 dl wagon. Fun little car to drive. Love the manual transmission. It failed safety. One issue I knew about. The steering I didn't. Turns out the inner tie rod ends were bad. So, had the shop replace the inner tie rod ends. Find out I need a new rack. New rack goes in and i pick the car up. Steering is all over the place. Felt like I was driving a boat. Had not felt like this when I dropped it off. Took it back and long story short, shop replace rack they put in with a cam gear rack. It drives better but still seems to want to drift a bit on the road. Almost like the back end has a heavy load and the front tires aren't getting good contact with the pavement. Reminds me of what happens when I load up my F250 with a couple pallets of tile. Shop that did the work showed me the alignment spec's and everything looks good. However, they are saying the castor is out of adjustment and there is nothing more the can do. Is the the case? The castor is not adjustable from what I've read. Besides taking the car to another shop for a second opinion what are my next steps?

Thanks,

 

I'd find a new mechanic. Where did they get the rack from? Is it rebuilt? If it steers worse than it did when you took it in, then it is something they did wrong. I would take it to a different shop for a proper alignment and go from there.

 

if your control arm bushings are shot, you can't get a consistent alignment, and the car will eat the outside edges of the front tires (don't ask me how I know this).

 

A good shop will not even align it in those circumstances. I have on two occasions had a shop tell me they won't align the car until various suspension issues were corrected.