Pittman, Tierod, or Ball Joints ?

[Ballistik]

When I turn left and go straight it doesn want to go to center unless I turn it to the right and then it pops back to center with no pull. I greased all the zerk fittings and it stopped for awhile but now its back and its worse than it was before. My question is what is causing this. The power steering seems to be fine. The tire size is 265/75/15 4x4 , 94 ranger with a 4.0 l in it. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for your time.

 

[Ranger5.0]

jack the front end up and get somone to shake the tire back and forth. The worn area's will show them selves

 

[Sasquatch_Ryda]

Sounds like you could have balljoints that are starting to seize. Jack it up and disconnect the tie rods from the knuckles and see if it is hard to turn the tires side to side by hand, if so the balljoints are seizing.

 

[pimtool]

Sounds like you could have balljoints that are starting to seize. Jack it up and disconnect the tie rods from the knuckles and see if it is hard to turn the tires side to side by hand, if so the balljoints are seizing.

What he said.

 

[MAKG]

Sure it could be, but there is no substitute for a solid inspection.

There are four ball sockets in the steering linkage and any one of them could be seizing as well. You can also get binding from the steering gear, particularly if someone has tried to adjust it.

Jack up the front of the vehicle and shake everything. Top and bottom of tires for balljoints, sides for TREs, and manhandle all the steering linkage parts.

 

[Ballistik]

Well I think I figured it out. It seems to be the passanger side front u Joints that are binding. Now all I have to do is figure out how to get the axel off.

 

[4x4junkie]

That certainly could do it.

Remove wheel > hub > caliper > rotor > spindle > axleshaft.
Then you'll have to get inside the diff to pop the clip off so you can get the innermost (center) shaft out. That one isn't as fun (you need to pull the diff off the beam, unless you can figure out a way to get a tool onto the shaft with it in the truck to press out the joint).

 

[Sasquatch_Ryda]

We torch out the the center u joint most of the time a work and use a u joint press to get the new one back in.

 

[Ballistik]

So I have to pull hte front diff off to get the inside of the axle off. There is no other way ? These dont pull off like a front wheel drive vehicle with some presure and pop out?

 

[Yellowsplash]

So I have to pull hte front diff off to get the inside of the axle off. There is no other way ? These dont pull off like a front wheel drive vehicle with some presure and pop out?

Not the passenger side inner...its held in by a c-clip and wont come out until the clip is removed, which requires you to remove the pig from the beam.

 

[4x4junkie]

It's not too big of a deal if you've already got both sides of the axle apart.

Its 10 bolts on the front of the axle beam, plus one bolt right behind the radius arm (and of course you have to undo the driveshaft). Then the diff comes right out (best done with the suspension fully drooped so the diff chunk clears the pivot bracket for the passengerside). Have something handy to catch the oil.
That bolt behind the radius arm can be tricky to get out however, sometimes you can grind the bolt head into a "D" shape to get it past the arm.