How to Tell if Your Tie Rod is Bad
Created on: 2010-10-07
Is your car's steering tie rod bad? Learn how to diagnose it with this helpful video from 1A Auto!
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step 1 :Raise and Secure the Vehicle
- Raise the Vehicle with a floor jack
- Secure the vehicle on jack stands
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step 2 :Inspecting the Tie Rods
- Turn the wheel back and forth by hand
- Look for looseness between the tie rod and the steering knuckle
- Try to move the tie rod by hand
- Check for movement in the tie rod
- Check for movement in the ball joint at the steering knuckle
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step 3 :Getting an Alignment
- Have the steering professionally aligned
Tools needed
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Jack Stands
Floor Jack
Brought to you by 1AAuto.com, your source for quality replacement parts and the best service on the Internet.
Hi, I'm Mike Green. I'm one of the owners of 1A Auto. I want to help you save time and money repairing or maintaining your vehicle. I'm going to use my 20-plus years experience restoring and repairing cars and trucks like this to show you the correct way to install parts from 1AAuto.com. The right parts installed correctly: that's going to save you time and money. Thank you and enjoy the video.
In this video we're going to show you what a bad tie rod end looks like. Usually, a bad tie rod is going to kind of feel like a little bit of clunk or shake in the steering wheel when you hit some bumps. It'll be on this '98 Ford Explorer, but this really applies to any vehicle. If you would like to see a tie rod end replaced, we do have a few different videos about replacing tie rod ends on different cars.
Here the upper arrow is pointing to the steering tie rod end, and the lower arrow is pointing to the steering knuckle. Depending on your vehicle, the tie rod could actually be going in below the steering knuckle rather than above as it is here. Also, you may find this behind the center of your wheel, where this is in front of the center of your wheel.
Basically, you want to move your tire in a way to see if there's any play. Those two pieces of metal should act in concert with each other. There should not be any play between them, and you'll see what I mean.
When you have your wheel raised you want to turn it back and forth. You can see that there is all kinds of play between here and here, which indicates that your outer tie rod is very bad on this truck. Also, this is pretty loose. This should move like this somewhat, but it should give me some resistance. You can see the ball moving in the socket there.
If you jack your car up and move your wheel and see this type of play, then you do need to replace your tie rod. Generally, it's not that difficult. Generally, you do need to get an alignment after you do something like that. We do have, like I said a few different videos on replacing the tie rod as well as we carry a bunch of different tie rods at 1aauto.com.
We hope this helps you out. Brought to you by www.1AAuto.com, your source for quality replacement parts and the best service on the Internet. Please feel free to call us toll-free, 888-844-3393. We're the company that's here for you on the Internet and in person.
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