I have spent the entire day looking for this important explanation. The fact that you used the model helped a lot with visual orientation. There are conflicting and misleading opinions online bordering on concepts like clockwise, counterclockwise, toe-in, toe-out, etc. Often, they confused my logical reasoning. Thank you so much. Nyceguy
Our 2002 Ford exploder was way out due to the jam nut loosening . He set up some type of string deal and lined the front up with his trim square and some wrenches. I took it to get an alignment and the technician said it was in spec . Go figure 🤔. He's an Engineer, not a mechanic. We were both surprised . Ended up buying a set of Michelin tires from them because they were honest with us . Your video was instrumental in ajusting it properly thanks 👍 .
Omg thank you. I have adjustable toe arms in the rear and couldn’t figure out how to adjust in the front. Didn’t want to damage something. Very helpful.
My tie rod doesn’t look like that. Mine has an adjustment sleeve with tie rod ends on both sides. That was a good explanation of the other version of a tie rod though. Thank you.
Great video! I remember the first time I tried to adjust my toe on my own. I kept removing the ball joint on the outer tie rod to spin it so I would get the right adjustment. Not, was I wrong. That drive to the alignment shop was TERRIBLE. 😂😂😂😂😂
Great vid. I recently had my front control arms changed and my right wheel seems like the toe is off a lot. Is this normal? I used to have noticeable negative camber in my fronts but now it looks almost 0 camber and like the front of the tire is pointed towards the engine. Do i need to adjust camber and toe or just toe?
Duuuuuuude!!! I've been taking the outer tie rod off to turn it! OMG I feel so stupid now, but that's why I'm watching these videos... I can at least spare my nylon lock nut before I give up entirely and take this to a shop. I mainly just don't know if I can describe the problem well enough for a mechanic to understand, so I'm trying to eliminate alignment as the problem first. I'd tell them to test drive it, but it's most pronounced on the highway and without already knowing how this car handles, that could be extremely dangerous. I'm in the Midwest, our streets are pretty rough and bumpy so it's hard to rule out the road and it is almost fine at less than 20 mph, so a parking lot is out of the question. Any alignment shops based out of an airport? That's the best place to test it.
Step1: Verify all tires are inflated and in good condition with even wear. Verify steering & suspension components are in excellent condition. Step 2: Take it to a shop that has a good alignment machine (Hunter or SnapOn) and get an alignment done after they also verify step 1 is acceptable. Step3: If problems still exist, ask a mechanic to drive it WITH YOU at high way speeds to point out concerns.
@@MrAdkinsAuto Thanks for your reply. I did find a mismatched tire a few days ago(I bought the car a week ago) which despite being higher pressure(35) than the other on the front(30), was "smushy" I think that tire may be defective, but I stuck it on the rear and balanced both front tire pressures and they are the same brand. This changed the issue, it was previously pulling hard left under acceleration(engine torque, which makes no sense, left axle is shorter FWD), then changed. "verify steering and suspension components are in excellent condition." Great advice, unfortunately, the only thing I can reliably check is tie rods and wheel bearing. Everything else confuses me, I've tried watching videos about control arms and ball joints, but I just cannot re-produce those tests, either the car pictured was too different, or I'm just am imbicile. Like "use a crow bar to move the control arm forward and backwards"... From where? It's a hollow semicircular tube.. Where do you pry against? The bushing rubber is still soft, I can push a fingernail into it... That's about all I know about my suspension condition. Professional alignment is definitely the best next step. I just dont want to spend the money to have it aligned and then find out there was another issue and have to get it aligned again; I presume they would just decline it. I had another car that a shop declined to do the alignment at all because the a strut mount was bad. Then I fixed that and another shop declined service because the inner tie rods were worn out. The thing is though, they wrote up $600+ estimates for labor on these wear items expecting me to approve that on the spot and sit in the shop for 4 hours. I'm working with old vehicles used for delivery, a repair estimate higher than the price I paid for the car just isn't going to work and then they get pissed when I say no thank you, I'm annoyed that I wasted 2 hours to get nothing accomplished but someone trying to up-sell me services. It's a massive waste of time and an opportunity for anxiety so I spend weeks tinkering and nights complaining on youtube that maybe someone will have had the exact same symptoms and documented everything. I'm hoping its just the toe angle, otherwise I will just deal with it I guess. I was going to work on it tonight but after I parked I found the driver front tire very low, aired it up and found a nail. It was down to 15 PSI, the drive home today was worse than yesterday, but I don't know when it got punctured so EVERYTHING was thrown back into the air and I walked away before I burst an aneurism. It "feels", from my untrained perspective, like it's an issue with the rack and pinion slipping. IDK if that's a thing, but it's like near TDC for the steering wheel "slips" back and forth, like worn gears. maybe 3 degrees in either direction, I mentioned in another comment I can turn right, steering left and turn left steering right, it just depends on where it kind of ends up and you have to feel it and constantly adjust the wheel trying to avoid a positive feedback loop where I look like a drunk person weaving through the lane and onto the shoulder. And a whole new perspective on accelerating through a turn. Its all linked to the weight of the car and when it shifts, the wheels do "something" if you can keep it totally balanced it's fine, but as soon as it goes out, it's rough. Left curves are near impossible, I actually just drive straight, then snap a few degrees left, then drive straight, repeating. Right curves are fine as long as you keep the exact same power to the wheels and don't let the weight shift. Turns are fine, because they are low speed. Curves are the real danger.
Hey question I’m not the brightest thing in the world but I think Honda ran game on me stating that my car which is a 2015 Honda Accord EX-L V6 toe couldn’t be adjusted and that only way I could get it adjusted is through a body shop. My car never been in a wreck or anything how true is this ?
Yes more threads = pulling toe in, less threads= toe pushig toe out and also remember if its pulling to the right or left it is usally the opposite tire, pulling right probly the left
I have a 69 mustang and the driver side wheel touches the fender and the passenger has over 1 finger gap. What is it I have to adjust to level both out ?
Hi thank for this , when doing 1 side eg front left do both wheels need to be jackd up does the steering wheel need to locked or not and if auto does need to be on neutral or not ? cheers
Ok so guys help me out here, I'm tryna adjust my left wheel toe do I twist clock wise or counter clockwise to go more toe out? My left wheel is basically facing inward the car and need to fix but when I tried it last night I literally did no difference
cadillac cts 2004 i just replaced shock spring upper arm control lower arm control inner tie rod n outer tie rod and hub assembly now my wheel on passenger side is very close to the front fender and bumper a very large space in the back of tire help plz and thanks before taken cat to shop
I took my Lexus rx350 suv for alignment to the shop 5 different times because still pulled left and right they didnt charge me for the other time only 1 price. And they rotated my tires still pulls left and right. Could it be my tie rods?
I would hope they did an inspection prior to performing the alignment. Assuming the tires are good, components are good and the alignment was done correctly, you may need to look at the SAS. Your vehicle may have a Steering Angle Sensor (SAS) which needs to be calibrated after an alignment if it does. Many shops skip this step bc they don't have the equipment. It will cause a LOT of issues if not calibrated.
@@MrAdkinsAuto cadillac cts 2004 i just replaced shock spring upper arm control lower arm control inner tie rod n outer tie rod and hub assembly now my wheel on passenger side is very close to the front fender and bumper a very large space in the back of tire help plz and thanks before taken cat to shop
OK I have a question when you make the adjustment to the inner tie rod for the alinement to move the wheel outward on a 99 Chevy Cavalier can I also make that same adjustment you made to the outer tie rod to have the same results of moving the wheel outward or inward ?
No, while the outer tie rod does pivot just a bit to allow for steering and suspension movement, it will not turn enough to make an adjustment. The flat spot on the outer tire rod is so you can place a wrench on it when tightening or loosening the jam nut. Only the inner tire rod will actually spin.
Could be a few things: Most likely, something is bent and the alignment is far enough off that the adjustment cannot be made to bring it back into spec. Also, make sure if any parts were replaced, they are the correct parts for the car. I also had a "repair center" do an alignment on my vehicle before I had an alignment rack and then had the steering wheel upside down so one side of the car was dialed all the way out while the other was dialed all the way in.
Caster and camber is not adjustable on many vehicles without aftermarket eccentric bolts or shims. If camber or caster is not correct is often means something is bent like a control arm or strut. Thanks for watching
While adjusting toe on my 2003 Chrysler Voyager 3.3 engine van with string, I accidentally moved the drivers side tire. String measurements said I was 1/16" toe in on both front wheels but steering wheel is left 20 degrees and vehicle drifts to the right some. What do I need to do???
Make sure steering wheel is straight and remeasure. Also, the string method is not accurate enough any more. Need to have a computerized alignment service performed. 1/4 turn of the tie rod is the difference between correct angle or having it wrong. They are sensitive.
You have to go to a place with an alignment machine and pay them to do it. The string method is a good tool to help you get down the road safely to get to the shop.
This video is quite a waste of everyone's time. That's apparent due to the 85,000 views and only 600 likes LoL. You basically said to turn this green thing back and forth until the computer tells you when to stop. You proved to have no knowledge on toe in or out.
No you dont. When you do an alignment on a computer, just loosen the jam nut and rotate the tire rod to 0 degrees (or the correct specification). Then tighten the jam nut, the tire rod will move just slightly but thats normal. Its not like you are going to throw your specifications off because you tightened a jam nut. Also, you dont have to even consider torque on a jam nut, its just a jam nut lol.
I have spent the entire day looking for this important explanation.
The fact that you used the model helped a lot with visual orientation.
There are conflicting and misleading opinions online bordering on concepts like clockwise, counterclockwise, toe-in, toe-out, etc. Often, they confused my logical reasoning.
Thank you so much.
Nyceguy
This is what I've been looking for, for the longest time thank you
My coworker kept hiding this for me, now I can even tutor him lol
Our 2002 Ford exploder was way out due to the jam nut loosening . He set up some type of string deal and lined the front up with his trim square and some wrenches. I took it to get an alignment and the technician said it was in spec . Go figure 🤔. He's an Engineer, not a mechanic. We were both surprised . Ended up buying a set of Michelin tires from them because they were honest with us . Your video was instrumental in ajusting it properly thanks 👍 .
Omg thank you. I have adjustable toe arms in the rear and couldn’t figure out how to adjust in the front. Didn’t want to damage something. Very helpful.
Google search showed me a snippet of this video giving me the exact answer to what I was looking for. Thank you for making this video. It helped.
“Put the needle in the green spot”
Bold of you to assume I’m going to use an alignment rig 😈😈
Lmfao same
This video should be viewed more. Its what I bbbeeeennn been been searching for. Took forever to find this
Glad you found it, thanks for watching!
thank you the video was helpful and it was much easier to adjust the toe than I was expecting!
My tie rod doesn’t look like that. Mine has an adjustment sleeve with tie rod ends on both sides. That was a good explanation of the other version of a tie rod though. Thank you.
Very good teaching video. Thanks very much.
Glad it was helpful!
Thank you for making this video.
Good Vid. Thanks!
Awesome video. Great explanation 👍
Great video! I remember the first time I tried to adjust my toe on my own. I kept removing the ball joint on the outer tie rod to spin it so I would get the right adjustment. Not, was I wrong. That drive to the alignment shop was TERRIBLE. 😂😂😂😂😂
😂 I did the same!
im debating on just driving right now lol
Your the best ,,, period. thank you so much knowledge is well you know that already ✌🏽 😇
Straight forward
Great vid. I recently had my front control arms changed and my right wheel seems like the toe is off a lot. Is this normal? I used to have noticeable negative camber in my fronts but now it looks almost 0 camber and like the front of the tire is pointed towards the engine. Do i need to adjust camber and toe or just toe?
Awesome video mate cheers!
Duuuuuuude!!! I've been taking the outer tie rod off to turn it! OMG I feel so stupid now, but that's why I'm watching these videos... I can at least spare my nylon lock nut before I give up entirely and take this to a shop. I mainly just don't know if I can describe the problem well enough for a mechanic to understand, so I'm trying to eliminate alignment as the problem first. I'd tell them to test drive it, but it's most pronounced on the highway and without already knowing how this car handles, that could be extremely dangerous. I'm in the Midwest, our streets are pretty rough and bumpy so it's hard to rule out the road and it is almost fine at less than 20 mph, so a parking lot is out of the question. Any alignment shops based out of an airport? That's the best place to test it.
Step1: Verify all tires are inflated and in good condition with even wear. Verify steering & suspension components are in excellent condition.
Step 2: Take it to a shop that has a good alignment machine (Hunter or SnapOn) and get an alignment done after they also verify step 1 is acceptable.
Step3: If problems still exist, ask a mechanic to drive it WITH YOU at high way speeds to point out concerns.
@@MrAdkinsAuto Thanks for your reply.
I did find a mismatched tire a few days ago(I bought the car a week ago) which despite being higher pressure(35) than the other on the front(30), was "smushy" I think that tire may be defective, but I stuck it on the rear and balanced both front tire pressures and they are the same brand.
This changed the issue, it was previously pulling hard left under acceleration(engine torque, which makes no sense, left axle is shorter FWD), then changed. "verify steering and suspension components are in excellent condition." Great advice, unfortunately, the only thing I can reliably check is tie rods and wheel bearing. Everything else confuses me, I've tried watching videos about control arms and ball joints, but I just cannot re-produce those tests, either the car pictured was too different, or I'm just am imbicile. Like "use a crow bar to move the control arm forward and backwards"... From where? It's a hollow semicircular tube.. Where do you pry against? The bushing rubber is still soft, I can push a fingernail into it... That's about all I know about my suspension condition.
Professional alignment is definitely the best next step. I just dont want to spend the money to have it aligned and then find out there was another issue and have to get it aligned again; I presume they would just decline it. I had another car that a shop declined to do the alignment at all because the a strut mount was bad. Then I fixed that and another shop declined service because the inner tie rods were worn out.
The thing is though, they wrote up $600+ estimates for labor on these wear items expecting me to approve that on the spot and sit in the shop for 4 hours. I'm working with old vehicles used for delivery, a repair estimate higher than the price I paid for the car just isn't going to work and then they get pissed when I say no thank you, I'm annoyed that I wasted 2 hours to get nothing accomplished but someone trying to up-sell me services. It's a massive waste of time and an opportunity for anxiety so I spend weeks tinkering and nights complaining on youtube that maybe someone will have had the exact same symptoms and documented everything.
I'm hoping its just the toe angle, otherwise I will just deal with it I guess. I was going to work on it tonight but after I parked I found the driver front tire very low, aired it up and found a nail. It was down to 15 PSI, the drive home today was worse than yesterday, but I don't know when it got punctured so EVERYTHING was thrown back into the air and I walked away before I burst an aneurism.
It "feels", from my untrained perspective, like it's an issue with the rack and pinion slipping. IDK if that's a thing, but it's like near TDC for the steering wheel "slips" back and forth, like worn gears. maybe 3 degrees in either direction, I mentioned in another comment I can turn right, steering left and turn left steering right, it just depends on where it kind of ends up and you have to feel it and constantly adjust the wheel trying to avoid a positive feedback loop where I look like a drunk person weaving through the lane and onto the shoulder.
And a whole new perspective on accelerating through a turn. Its all linked to the weight of the car and when it shifts, the wheels do "something" if you can keep it totally balanced it's fine, but as soon as it goes out, it's rough. Left curves are near impossible, I actually just drive straight, then snap a few degrees left, then drive straight, repeating. Right curves are fine as long as you keep the exact same power to the wheels and don't let the weight shift. Turns are fine, because they are low speed. Curves are the real danger.
Thank you 🙏
? With my passenger front tire having outside edge wear on my 03 dodge Dakota 4wd would the toe need to be turned in or out.
Hey question I’m not the brightest thing in the world but I think Honda ran game on me stating that my car which is a 2015 Honda Accord EX-L V6 toe couldn’t be adjusted and that only way I could get it adjusted is through a body shop. My car never been in a wreck or anything how true is this ?
Yes more threads = pulling toe in, less threads= toe pushig toe out and also remember if its pulling to the right or left it is usally the opposite tire, pulling right probly the left
Great video, please make more!
Thanks!
How much does total toe change if you turn inner tie rod 1 turn? Approximately. Thanks.
Thank You!!!
Good info
I have a 69 mustang and the driver side wheel touches the fender and the passenger has over 1 finger gap. What is it I have to adjust to level both out ?
Hi thank for this , when doing 1 side eg front left do both wheels need to be jackd up does the steering wheel need to locked or not and if auto does need to be on neutral or not ? cheers
What's to keep the inner tierod from working off of the rack?
Ok so guys help me out here, I'm tryna adjust my left wheel toe do I twist clock wise or counter clockwise to go more toe out? My left wheel is basically facing inward the car and need to fix but when I tried it last night I literally did no difference
You turn it the same way on passenger side.
cadillac cts 2004 i just replaced shock spring upper arm control lower arm control inner tie rod n outer tie rod and hub assembly now my wheel on passenger side is very close to the front fender and bumper a very large space in the back of tire help plz and thanks before taken cat to shop
Did you put the upper or lower control arm on backwards? That is usually the cause of big gap like you are describing.
Can you lock the steering wheel while adjusting
I was looking for a old school way ya know with a tape measure and a human brain.. guess we'd be lost without a computer to do the thinking
Nice .
I took my Lexus rx350 suv for alignment to the shop 5 different times because still pulled left and right they didnt charge me for the other time only 1 price. And they rotated my tires still pulls left and right. Could it be my tie rods?
I would hope they did an inspection prior to performing the alignment. Assuming the tires are good, components are good and the alignment was done correctly, you may need to look at the SAS. Your vehicle may have a Steering Angle Sensor (SAS) which needs to be calibrated after an alignment if it does. Many shops skip this step bc they don't have the equipment. It will cause a LOT of issues if not calibrated.
So if I have one tire pointed more in than the other this is what I need to do?
You need to have a shop perform an alignment. Check out my video ua-cam.com/video/Fcfk3z0p4Fs/v-deo.html
@@MrAdkinsAuto cadillac cts 2004 i just replaced shock spring upper arm control lower arm control inner tie rod n outer tie rod and hub assembly now my wheel on passenger side is very close to the front fender and bumper a very large space in the back of tire help plz and thanks before taken cat to shop
What if i don't use the jam nut??
Will it be ok or something will fall off??
Vibration will cause the rod to spin within a few miles dude. So your adjustment will go out. Why would you ask this. It’s common sense
OK I have a question when you make the adjustment to the inner tie rod for the alinement to move the wheel outward on a 99 Chevy Cavalier can I also make that same adjustment you made to the outer tie rod to have the same results of moving the wheel outward or inward ?
No, while the outer tie rod does pivot just a bit to allow for steering and suspension movement, it will not turn enough to make an adjustment. The flat spot on the outer tire rod is so you can place a wrench on it when tightening or loosening the jam nut. Only the inner tire rod will actually spin.
Hi, please advise the steps to take if the alingment adjustment is full done and and there is no more way to adjust it for fj cruiser.
Could be a few things: Most likely, something is bent and the alignment is far enough off that the adjustment cannot be made to bring it back into spec. Also, make sure if any parts were replaced, they are the correct parts for the car. I also had a "repair center" do an alignment on my vehicle before I had an alignment rack and then had the steering wheel upside down so one side of the car was dialed all the way out while the other was dialed all the way in.
Doing this won't cause the steering wheel to move?
Yes it can. You have to hold the steering wheel in place with a special fixture once you have it perfectly straight.
Make a Vedio on Caster and camber same as toe adjustment Vedio
Caster and camber is not adjustable on many vehicles without aftermarket eccentric bolts or shims. If camber or caster is not correct is often means something is bent like a control arm or strut. Thanks for watching
While adjusting toe on my 2003 Chrysler Voyager 3.3 engine van with string, I accidentally moved the drivers side tire. String measurements said I was 1/16" toe in on both front wheels but steering wheel is left 20 degrees and vehicle drifts to the right some. What do I need to do???
Make sure steering wheel is straight and remeasure. Also, the string method is not accurate enough any more. Need to have a computerized alignment service performed. 1/4 turn of the tie rod is the difference between correct angle or having it wrong. They are sensitive.
You have to go to a place with an alignment machine and pay them to do it. The string method is a good tool to help you get down the road safely to get to the shop.
Kenneth Adkins you are completely full of shit. If you know how to setup the string properly, it is as accurate or more.
Need rear toe adj.on my 02 maxima
It's like I always say fuck my tires
This video is quite a waste of everyone's time. That's apparent due to the 85,000 views and only 600 likes LoL. You basically said to turn this green thing back and forth until the computer tells you when to stop. You proved to have no knowledge on toe in or out.
to lock it you need two wrenches and apply proper torque. very unprofessional
That's is what I thought as well cause the inner tie rod moved when he just used one wrench.
No you dont. When you do an alignment on a computer, just loosen the jam nut and rotate the tire rod to 0 degrees (or the correct specification). Then tighten the jam nut, the tire rod will move just slightly but thats normal. Its not like you are going to throw your specifications off because you tightened a jam nut. Also, you dont have to even consider torque on a jam nut, its just a jam nut lol.
So my jeep does not have that style setup