2000 Buick Century hard to steer

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Hey guys.

Not too happy today, my friend, who has always worked on my vehicles, today installed an inner, and outer tie rod on my mothers 2000 Buick century.

Got the car back and got it home, and now it's incredibly difficulty to steer, moreso to the left side(side of replaced tie rods). There is also a clunk, and binding that occurs when steering to the left. At first I thought the power steering pump might be on it's way out, because at first revving it up would allow me to steer easier, but now it's gotten a lot worse.
Something I noticed is that when the car is running, the power steering fluid does not go down, and it is indeed full. When steering to either side you can hear the pump working hard, hissing, and occasionally the belt will squeak.


What did my friend mess up, please don't say rack.

All right maybe it's the rack.

It's most likely the rack.
 
Could be a binding joint in the new parts. Could be something installed upside down/backwards, doesn't have the normal range of travel or flex. Could be a bad P/S pump. Could be the rack.

Get underneath and see if the left and right parts look symmetric.
 
That's the only thing that makes any sense. The inner has no installed position but the outer goes in from the top on this car IIRC, if he put installed it from the bottom that would cause the problem.
 
My brother and I did the whole front end on his Chevy truck last summer and accidentally put the sway bar in upside down. It creaked and groaned and binded and rubbed until we figured out it was upside down.
 
Outer was installed correctly, and it doesn't bind when jacked up in the air. The power steering got worse, and the clunk went away. I'm leaning toward the power steering pump dying out, it doesn't sound the hottest, kind of sounds like the bearings are screaming for jesus. Car was not aligned yet, waiting to do that thursday or friday hopefully, its definitely out of wack, but not terrible, drives pretty straight but it has a slight vibration at higher speed.

I'm going to go with the cheaper route and call him a jinx, I'll let you folks know what happens with the new P/S pump. I appreciate all the replies guys, always feels good to have a little extra knowledge to back me up, I love this forum.
 
Originally Posted By: JimmyJohns
kind of sounds like the bearings are screaming for jesus.


lol.gif


I come here for the LOLZ

true story.
 
At first thought I'd say he put something in wrong. See what the alignment shop says. A good alignment shop should drive the car first and inspect the front end before doing the alignment. Good luck!
 
This model IIRC uses an aluminum knuckle, over tighten the outer and the knuckle can crack, there is also a TRB for removing some material around the boot with a die grinder so it doesn't cut the boot, may be you can find it.
I have no idea how the guy got the inner off, with the tool and a bar or did he use an impact? This one uses crimped inner joints that need to be crimped after they are installed.

Some guys use loctite and tighten them nut busting tight instead of a crimp and damage the racks teflon inner and rubber outer seals, its common for them to start leaking a short time after. This stuff is Auto Mechanics 101 so if the guy is any sort of mechanic he should have avoided this.

 
Little update for you guys, I really appreciate all of the information provided. I have a co worker who is a GM master tech and upon his advice I proceeded to bleed the power steering. What he suggested was to jack the front end up, remove the power steering cap and turn the steering wheel full lock left and right with the vehicle off 50-75 times, let it sit for 10 minutes and repeat, let it sit and then do it with the vehicle running. Unfortunately that did not solve the issue, and I inspected the front the best I could and could not find anything out of the ordinary. My mother who first drove the vehicle after the new inner and outer, told me that the steering was fine until she got to the corner from our house, after that it began to bind and not have power steering. I can't 100% blame the repair, it could be just coincidence, but if I had to guess he must have reefed on the rack or forced the new innner in, and when she went full lock at the corner from our house it did it in. Again, I don't know for certain if it was a result of his repair, but here we are.


So this past weekend, I installed a new power steering rack and lines, and it's in for an alignment today, and so far it's a successful repair. Seems like it's going to need a control arm on the driver side soon, but the bushing is just a little stretched, not torn and not falling out or clunking.

That was a PITA to replace, but I feel accomplished, and saved a good bit of money and put my tool collection to use. Ran into one hiccup, one of the front frame bolts started spinning, the weld on the nut in the frame must have broke, managed to fit a 22mm half inch socket and ratchet in there with some map gas and hit it with the impact and she tightened right up.


Thank you again for the information guys.
 
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