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MG MGF Technical - Steering issues.

Drove a friends F on the way back from MGF10 and noticed a very odd steering "feature"

With the steering wheel held steady the car will veer right then slowly move back left so that on average the car goes in a straight line but by snaking down the road! The veer to the right is much more severe than the gentle drift left that follows it.

Also, accelerating, the car drifts left and when you take your foot off the power it veers right.

Ruts in the road also initiate the problem.

The recently fitted KH splitter seems to have made the issue more noticable.

Any ideas?
Thanks in advance.
Russell Parslow

Russell, what wheels/ tyres is this car wearing? As Alan Phillips indicated during his talk at MGF10, the 215 profile rubber on 16" rims does lead to steering corruption - tramlining etc - so this could be one explanation. They got around this issue by dropping the front tyre pressure to 24psi.

The other possibility is an EPAS issue. If the front of the car is jacked up, and the ignition switched on, do the wheels 'steer' on their own?
Rob Bell

Its a 75LE which does have 16' wheels and they are the same size all round.

But the uneven left/right motion makes me think it might be some sort of loose/worn component of steering geometry.

Tracking has been checked after hydragas was pumped up.
Russell Parslow

Could it be a loose track rod end or steering rack?
Russell Parslow

Kwikfit found that front wheels were out by 3mm with respect to each other and 3mm with respect to rear wheels. My friend will see if that improves things.
Russell Parslow

3mm out in what dimension Russell?
Rob Bell

This thread was discussed between 17/10/2005 and 20/10/2005

MG MGF Technical index

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