I posted about this a few months ago but I must not have explained it correctly. The problem I'm having is that when I turn the steering wheel almost all the way to the right or left and then I slowly move (forward or reverse), the car slightly hops up and down as if I were continuously running over something with one of the front tires. It started doing this back in December and it's driving me crazy. It happens when the car is going formward or in reverse. I put the car on a lift and I checked all 4 tires to see if I had any warping on them, but they look perfect. I also thought that one of my tires might be rubbing against the inside fender wall, but that's unlikely because I would have had this problem from day one. I also checked to see if there was slack along the steering bar (not sure what its called) that connects the 2 front tires, and everything checked out OK. Here's something that's weird though, when someone is sitting in the passenger seat it tends no to do it at all. But when I'm alone in the car it does it every time I pull into a parking spot (because I'm cutting the wheel pretty far) or back out of a parking spot. So basically when weight is added to the passenger side of the car, it doesn't do it. I'm very desperate to get this problem fixed, so ANY info on the subject is greatly appreciated. Sorry for the long post and thanks in advance.

 

Man that is weird.Mine is a 93 as well,and the only thing I can think of is(a long shot),maybe the rear end locking up in some kinda way.My car does weird stuff every once in a while,but I've grown used this living animal.If you do change the rear fluid remmember the additive to quite things down.Please post when you find the answer.My02

 

Thanks for the reply fatdog, but I'm 99.9% positive that the problem is coming from the front of the car. It either has to do with a bad strut, control arm, rubbing, or steering problem. I was hoping someone has had the same problem but it looks like I'm the only one. D&MN!

 

Get under there and check to see anything that looks out of the ordinary. Get another pair of eyes on it too. The first thing that popped into my mind is posi but that usually causes wheel hop on the rear.

 

96 WS6, a buddy and I put the car on a lift and peeped it out for a good two hours. We couldn't find any problems at all.

 

It is not unusual to sometimes get a "sawing" motion in a real tight, slow turn. It is generally because the front tires are not turning in exactly the same arc. When you have added weight to one side, it changes the geometry slightly.

Have you rotated your tires since noticing this? There also may be some wear in them that you cannot detect with the naked eye.

 

Caster, or the rearward tilt of the spindle which causes self-centering of the front wheels, can be the cause of what you observe.

Caster results in significant camber changes when the wheels are near full lock. In other words, the tires are tipping up on their outer edges or shoulders, and the hopping is the tire skipping along as the tread blocks on the loaded edges distort, lose traction and bite again.

Have someone drive your car in this condition as you watch the contact point of the tires with the road.


My $.02

 

Shoebox, your post exactly describes my problem. The car is "sawing" up and down only when I'm moving slowly in a very tight turn. After I noticed this I had the car aligned and I had the tires balanced and rotated. However, the problem is still there. I'm going to have a buddy of mine drive the car while I check it out, hopefully we can figure it out. When I find out what the problem is, I'll be sure to let everyone know.

OldSStroker, I'll look into that, thanks.

THANK'S-A-TRILLION Shoebox and OldSStroker, your posts are greatly appreciated.