Outer Limits 4x4 Board

Have just put a two inch efs lift in my cruiser ute, have rebuilt the front diff with new hub/wheel bearing and seal kit,new locktup cvs, all new tie rod ends and return to centre steering damper. do i need to fit 2 degree caster wedges? took it for a drive today and it wanders big time, also the front wheels seem to be on a fairly big caster angle,instead of being straight up and down they are leaning out at the bottom,anyone know what could be causing it?Cheers mick

with any lift done, a wheel alignment is meant to be done straight after, as from what youve said you put it in yourself,
I hope when you rebuilt your front diff you got the upgraded inner axle seals from locktup too, their massive!!
take it to pedders, or someone you can trust and they might be able to help, pedders is pretty cheap.
i wouldnt think youd need the caster wedges, as anything over 2inch would need, as i had the arb 2inch stuff put in, and no wedges needed.
you might have other issues, like a stuffed idler arm..
only a guess from my utes problems, oh mines a 84hj47trayback if that helps.

yeh i put the heavy duty seals in also, iv doubled checked everything, done all the measurements between tie rod ends etc, all good, a wheel alignment only does toe in/out, it drives straight until you hit a bump or pothole then it just takes off to the left or right, its caster thats wrong with it, only thing i can think of is maybe the diff housing is bent?

my hj75 is doing the same thing after a full front end rebuild let me know how you go as i need to sort it as well

scmick wrote:Have just put a two inch efs lift in my cruiser ute, have rebuilt the front diff with new hub/wheel bearing and seal kit,new locktup cvs, all new tie rod ends and return to centre steering damper. do i need to fit 2 degree caster wedges? took it for a drive today and it wanders big time, also the front wheels seem to be on a fairly big caster angle,instead of being straight up and down they are leaning out at the bottom,anyone know what could be causing it?Cheers mick

Leaning out at the bottom is camber. which is non adjustable on a solid diff. but your right in that castor angle does play a big part in wandering issues. take it to a GOOD wheel alignment place preferably one that handles trucks, or regularly deals with solid front ends(not pedders unless you know for a fact the local one does good work), and they will be able to measure your casstor and camber angles. then you can work out if you need wedges to fix castor, or what ever the problem is

Poorly designed lift kits can affect castor. BUT 2 inches is pretty low a lift to start raising issues. extended shackles are usually more of an issue when it comes to throwing castor out of whack

When you did the rebuild, did you put the knuckle bearing shims in the same place they came out of, or did you use a hub centering tool?

did you set the pre-load on the knuckle bearings properly?

have you re-checked the pre load? because as the cone washers seat down over time they take the tension off the bearing.

the last few lines are guesswork as to why it would show up after a rebuild.

did you have any luck with the wandering or did you sort out your problem ?

sorted mine was the rock ring and longfield wiper seals i fitted the seal i designed to wear to the Crome ball and i just had the rock ring bolts over tighten back them off 1/2 a turn and is perfect now

will find out next week when it goes in for roadworthy,idler arm had rust in end,wasnt allowing tierod in far enough,couldnt find anything else,will still need wheel alignment to

You need a wheel alignment to check everything out. As well as negative caster, too much toe-out will make the steering very twitchy and wander around a lot.