Steering wheel turned after pitman and idler arm swap

Brandons033 · September 13, 2017

Hey everyone.. this is Brandon, I'm new to this forum. I have a 2002 Silverado 1500. I have a problem now that I changed my idler and Pitman arm. My steering wheel is turned about 45degrees to the left now that everything is all swapped out. It still drives straight and doesn't pull. It also turns about 1.5 turns each way when the wheels are straight (which is when the steering wheel is at 45degrees left). I put the new pittman arm in the same way the old one came out so I don't see why the wheel would be so far off. Would an alignment fix this or would I for some reason need to take out the pitman arm and turn the steering shaft the other way? I'm lost and frustrated at this point. I have an alignment scheduled in a couple of days but I wanted to figure this out before I go to the shop so I don't waste mine or their time. Thanks everyone!

Edited September 13, 2017 by Brandons033

Supreme Pizza · September 13, 2017

Ya, you could take the front end stuff apart, straiten all 3 wheels, and bolt it back up. Alignment might work, as long as you don't run out of tie rod. In the old days, You could just take the steering wheel off and point it what ever way you want (not a good idea on newer rigs). Try not to get frustrated. Keep at it, and you will get it all sorted out. I do all of my own toe alignments at home. Its pretty easy to do, and can result in a better toe alignment than what the shop does.

Edited September 13, 2017 by starman8tdc

BOSS324 · September 13, 2017

Have it aligned should fix it. I had the same symptom.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N920A using Tapatalk

Larry S · April 8, 2018

I was having a similar problem only I was acting as my own mechanic. I replaced the idler arm, tie rods, and pitman arm on my 97 suburban. When I was done the car turned very sharp to the right and not very sharp to the left. After viewing many forums, scratching my head a lot, removing much of what I had just installed, I noticed the center link can be flipped around and that I had done that. The center link(bar between the pitman arm and the idler arm) is just a little longer on one side than the other and can be installed backwards or flipped left and right. After I turned the center link around the right way, the steering wheel was more or less centered up and the steering turned the same amount both directions, more or less.

2006chevy4×4 · September 9, 2018

@Larry S I am having a similiar issue. I replaced the following on my truck: pitman arm, idler arm, idler arm mounting bracket, inner and outer tie rod ends, upper and lower control arms, and added bilstien 5100 shocks as the truck has reprofiling keys. Now that I put it back together and took it for an alignment the truck has play in the stearing wheel when the tires are straight. It's about 20° left and right. (hopefully that's not outrageous, I'm doing the best I can to estimate its plenty enough to notice but it's also not an insane amount.) When I rock the stearing wheel back and forth for the breadth of the slop the trucks stearing seems to not be affected. I am pretty sure I got everything back together correctly, however it is possible that I put the relay rod on backwards as you said that you did. Do you remember how you ended up figuring out you had it on backwards? Also if anyone has heard of this please, or has ideas please let me know, I'm pretty lost on this.