i noticed yesterday that my 4runner turns a better circle left than right. is this normal?

 

maybe the pitman arm's off a tooth?

 

need a girlfriend much? :

Check your steering stops (google image). They are what determine the range of motion of the steering.

 

Is this a recent problem? Is the steering wheel straight when going straight down the road?
Have you done any hard wheeling or hit anything with either front tire lately?

Are you hitting the steering stops when turning right?

 

maybe I'm slow today... but I don't get it

 

I don't get it either. Must take a Canadian to understand tight left versus tight right.

As nice as it sounds to say the steering stops determine the range of motion in the front wheels, that is not always true. If any one of the following: tie rod, drag link, idler arm or relay rod are bent or mis-adjusted; that could easily cause one wheel to turn in to a tighter arc than the other and change the turning radius to favor one side over the other.

 

Exactly my point.

 

i just got the t4r last week. you were right about the steering stops. i took a good look and the driverside arm touches much faster than the other one thus giving the turning radius. cant i just disconnect it then give the steering wheel a turn then put it back on? i like how it turns left i can make a u-turn anywhere but im going to loose that if i adjust it to compensate for the right hand turn. is there a procedure for this?

 

wait wait wait, what do you mean "the driver's side arm touches much faster than the other one"?

and are you talking about disconnecting the pitman arm and turning the wheel a bit and then putting it back on? if so, then yes that'll be the fix to the arm being off a tooth if that's what you're getting at. and then unless you can deal with a crooked steering wheel, you'll have to take it to get aligned, becuase in order to compensate for the fix the tie-rod ends have to be adjusted to straighten the wheel back out

had to do the same thing when I replaced my gearbox; I installed my pitman arm off a tooth at first and I could turn sharper right then left




oh by the way... I hate being right

 

So wait... the driver's side stop touches first but the truck also makes left turns sharper?
Since the driver's side is on the left (at least in Florida), and it hits the stop first, and you make sharper left turns... I'm really confused: if you turn the wheel left, the left rear stop bottoms out and you can turn sharper left than if you're turning right.
If that is correct, you've got something keeping the right wheel from turning all the way to the right. Considering there are two stops on each wheel, hard to say what the problem is- may be the front stop on the left wheel limiting how far the steering moves, may be the arm off the steering box... like I said: hard to say.

 

I still think you have bent something as abe stated above.

 

ok ok yes to make a left turn the drivers pitman arm touches the stop. then to make a right turn its the pass idle arm that touches the stop. i had it backwards lol. i think its what iamsuperbleeder and desertcamper67 are saying.

 

I don't believe your pitman arm has any stops to hit. Unless you have pre-'86 factory 4x4 steering gear and a SFA.

 

is this a steering stop? i have one on either side .

 

yeah there's one of those on each side, for the pitman arm and idler arm, but the steering stops at the tires should hit before those

 

i came across this thread. I just got all my suspension redone and now my steering is more limited than before, I get around 3.3 lock to lock now. Don't know what it was before but I can't make a u turn like I did before it's like 2-3 feet wider. Pretty sure the shop and alignment shop might be retards cuz I told them about it and they supposedly fixed it. So would I need to adjust the the teeth a bit on the pitman arms then re-align to get tighter turning radius? Right now when wheels are forward both pitman steering arms are pretty much pointed straight back, is that correct?