Zafira pulling to the left but tracking ok??

F_Bear

just got my brother a 1 women owner 54 zafira with 62k, a FSH and T&T till end of march 13 for £1600.

during the test drive it pulled slightly to the left, upon mentioning it the lady says 'oh, i sometimes hit the drive kerb when i reverse onto it' no comment.

i assumed it would be the tracking, and as i was practically stealing the car, i thought it no problem.

once paid and signed for we took it to a tyre center for the tracking. the mechanic put it on and the tracking was fine :mad:

during the test drive it braked in a straight line so not binding. and the left side tyre just had slight scrubbing on the outside edge.

im now wondering if the track rod arm could be bent if that makes sense?

motorguy

track rod end maybe, but could be two different brands of tyres on the front wheels?

red_eye

front sub frame not aligned or it could be that the tyre fitter has mis read the guage/ not calibrated. I would take it to a reputable garage (google ATA)

Joe_Horner

Track rods should have shown up as part of the tracking check, and most pulling isn't caused by tracking issues anyway. Tracking tends to cause heavy steering / too much self centering (toed in to far) or light / vague / lack of self centering (toed out too far). Alignment normally has to be really bad to create a pull to one side.

Pulling is generally one of the following:

Tyre pressures - equality between the sides is more important than acutal pressures for this.

Brake binding. Just because it brakes straight doesn't mean the front left caliper is releasing fully. Simple to test - jack each front wheel up and turn by hand. If the l/h has more drag than the right, there's your problem. Check the rears too, but rears tend to cause a "drift" rather than pronounced pull.

Tyres that don't like each other. That doesn't mean they have to all be the same brand, you can usually mix quite happily. But very occasionally you'll find that two tyres just don't like being on the same axle. Even same brand and style can suffer from this. Swap the front & rear on one side and see if it changes.

Worn suspension joints. This can put things out of line when you're moving, but the chances are that checking the free & easy points above will cure it before you have to worry about this one

F_Bear

thanks for the replys, i'll check the tyres and check the bind test tomo.

Strider590

Tracking was checked, lazy technician adjusted one side rather than centering the wheel and adjusting both left and right hand track rods.

sk240

Check what tyres are on it, if a cheap brand if they wear funny they grip differently causing the car to pull one side.I had this with a set of accellara tyres.

slyracoon

Could be many things.

We had this on our Mazda5, tyre place said tracking was fine so it took a look around all the wheels myself and it turned one of the rear shock absorber mounts had sheared with shock absorber just wobbling around.