Has anyone had trouble with allignment on your box??? My Lava is about two months old, and I've never hit any dips in the road, taken turns too hard, or went up/over a curb, but my allignment seems off now for no reason...I just noticed it today while driving to work...My tire pressure seems to be fine too with no change in the PSI I usualy have it at...

I now have powergrab from the torque when taking off from a stop (never had it before today), and the steering wheel is off while driving and at a resting point (it was always straight at all times)...One interesting thing though is I only get a pull to the left while driving...There is no grab at all in either direction while braking...I'm confused...

How sensitive is the steering assembly that it could just go out on me??? Anyone else have allignment problems yet??? If so, is it covered under warranty for going out in the first 12 months of ownership??? My last two cars were so I'm curious to see if I have to shell out some money to get it corrected...

Thanks!!!

DAN

i too have had probs w the alignment, i needed one badly from the get go...it was almost like they rushed soo bad to get me my car by the end of the month, they skipped some quality procedures...now after one dealer alignment, i am going to need another, cause they aligned it, and it now pulls the opposite way! good luck mofo! 8)

Has anyone had trouble with allignment on your box??? My Lava is about two months old, and I've never hit any dips in the road, taken turns too hard, or went up/over a curb, but my allignment seems off now for no reason...I just noticed it today while driving to work...My tire pressure seems to be fine too with no change in the PSI I usualy have it at...

I now have powergrab from the torque when taking off from a stop (never had it before today), and the steering wheel is off while driving and at a resting point (it was always straight at all times)...One interesting thing though is I only get a pull to the left while driving...There is no grab at all in either direction while braking...I'm confused...

How sensitive is the steering assembly that it could just go out on me??? Anyone else have allignment problems yet??? If so, is it covered under warranty for going out in the first 12 months of ownership??? My last two cars were so I'm curious to see if I have to shell out some money to get it corrected...

Thanks!!!

DAN

There is no allignment needed on our xb's I was told by my friend who happens to be a Toyota tech. I ask the same question after I installed new wheels on my xB. Check your wheel balance.

are you serious man?...IM callin BS on that..anyone care to clarify?

Many have noticed that their steering wheel is about 3 to 4 degrees left. It's so common, I thought it would be a good name for a Scion club. "3 degrees left".

My allignment is not off, but the steering wheel sits 3 degrees left at rest. It's annoying as heck and I'm going to try to correct it next time I get an allignment done. You probably have nothing to worry about.

I have the same problem, but it only started after I got my wheels!

Has anyone had trouble with allignment on your box??? My Lava is about two months old, and I've never hit any dips in the road, taken turns too hard, or went up/over a curb, but my allignment seems off now for no reason...I just noticed it today while driving to work...My tire pressure seems to be fine too with no change in the PSI I usualy have it at...

I now have powergrab from the torque when taking off from a stop (never had it before today), and the steering wheel is off while driving and at a resting point (it was always straight at all times)...One interesting thing though is I only get a pull to the left while driving...There is no grab at all in either direction while braking...I'm confused...

How sensitive is the steering assembly that it could just go out on me??? Anyone else have allignment problems yet??? If so, is it covered under warranty for going out in the first 12 months of ownership??? My last two cars were so I'm curious to see if I have to shell out some money to get it corrected...

Thanks!!!

DAN

There is no allignment needed on our xb's I was told by my friend who happens to be a Toyota tech. I ask the same question after I installed new wheels on my xB. Check your wheel balance.

Let me put it this way, I was informed that very little adjustment can be done that would make any differance in your allignment.

As for the streering wheel issue, there's a TSB for that adjustment.

is there a link to the service bulletin?..i know corolla toys (sumthin like that) has a bunch..dont rem seeing that particular one..

Orataro...just want to blatantly state, not trying to start any shiz..just needing some answers homie!! :)

8)

thanks all

Ours was to the left when we picked it up. I noticed it on the drive home. A week later we brought it in and I had them look at it and move it over a notch when then it was 6 deg to the rt. Well that was unstifactory so they said bring it back tommroow and they will put their alignment specialist on it. I got it back the next day and it was fine. Driveing down the freeway no hands on the wheel and it was perfectly up and down. We notified our dealer right away and it was covered under warentee. They even gave us a lowner car till we got ours back.

Ours was to the left when we picked it up. I noticed it on the drive home. A week later we brought it in and I had them look at it and move it over a notch when then it was 6 deg to the rt. Well that was unstifactory so they said bring it back tommroow and they will put their alignment specialist on it. I got it back the next day and it was fine. Driveing down the freeway no hands on the wheel and it was perfectly up and down. We notified our dealer right away and it was covered under warentee. They even gave us a lowner car till we got ours back.

this is almost EXACTLY what has ahppened to ours...i will adress it when i go in for my oil change then

thanks for the reply magnus

Mine was cocked to the left as well, but also pulls to the left, which leads me to believe that it came from the factory this way. I will probably have an allignment done in a month or 2.

my alignment seems ok, it is just that the steering wheel is turned to one side a little bit. the car tracks straight.

there were some other questions about this also

http://www.scionlife.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=737&highlight=alignment

http://www.scionlife.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=737&highlight=alignment

Thanks for the replies and input everyone, I really appreciate it :)

I took my Box to the dealership yesterday and they checked the allignment...They told me that the wheel being slightly off to the left was very common and was nothing to worry about...My problem causing the pull to the left was a weight that fell off of my right front tire...So the balance was just off...Theyt replaced the weight and made sure the tires were balanced properly, and I was on my way and driving perfectly straight again in under an hour :) It was also covered under warranty, and I was informed we have warranties on allignments for the first 12,000 miles...So they said if something else goes wrong, bring it back in and they'll take care of it :)

DAN

Wanted to bring this back up. Are you all still having this problem? Has anyone else gotten it fixed correctly by the dealership? I took my xB back to the dealership where I bought it 3 times to try to have this fixed. The first time they said they couldn't do anything because it was too windy to diagnose on the road. The second time the tech said the toe was off and that he set the toe to the correct specs. The service writer told me at first they couldn't find the correct specs because the car is so new. She said they did fix it, but I don't know where they got the specs from. This "fix" seemed like it made the problem less noticeable, but the wheel still sits a few degrees left even if I'm driving totally straight on a flat road. The third time they said there was nothing wrong.

I've contacted Scion and have even been through NCDS arbitration (the stuff Toyota puts info about in the owners manual for solving disputes) and had my claim denied so Toyota is refusing to do anything else about the problem.

I think the first time the tech was on the right track but didn't fix the toe right. It made the steering wheel less off center, but it is still not centered. I was thinking about trying another dealership, but I think they'd have notice from Toyota not to try to fix the problem again since they don't think there is anything wrong.

Should I just go to some tire/service chain to see if they can find anything wrong? I don't mind paying fifty or sixty bucks for an alignment if thats what it takes. If I take the car somewhere else and they fix the problem, I really don't know what I should do. I would be so ____ed at Toyota for giving me all this guff and saying nothing was wrong with the car when there was all along.

Should I just go to some tire/service chain to see if they can find anything wrong? I don't mind paying fifty or sixty bucks for an alignment if thats what it takes. If I take the car somewhere else and they fix the problem, I really don't know what I should do. I would be so ____ed at Toyota for giving me all this guff and saying nothing was wrong with the car when there was all along.

You might wanna try another Scion dealer.

I just went in for my 15,000 mile service, and I told them about the steering wheel being 3 degrees to the left. I thought it was something they could adjust really quickly without an alignment, but they gave me a 4 wheel alignment anyways and my steering wheel was fixed - all under warranty! I even had aftermarket springs on! As a bonus, my oil change (the 4th) was free, I just paid to have my tires rotated ($18).

Moral of the story: going to dealerships is a crapshoot, you never know what you're gonna get :?

make sure your on a perfectly flat straight road
a "crowned" road can make it seem you need an alignment

the scions do need alignments just like all cars
the xa/xb share the same platform as the echo so i don't know what toyota tech said that but ummm yea........

take it to the dealer and get them to test drive it, take it 2 diffrent ones if you have to, some dealers will see a small problem and let it go because they dont' feel like doing it which is sad but it happens
or you can just go in and demand an alignment :P

I actually went in and was going to demand an allignment, but then I heard about a lot of the xB's having the steering wheel off 3 degrees to the left when driving straight or at a complete stop in it's resting position...

I took my box to a trusted mechanic my family has been going to for years, and had them hook it up to their allignment computer, and they said everything was completely within specs...(And yes they were able to get the correct specs)...I have no idea why a dealership would tell someone they don't have the specs because the car is so new??? So I had them do the adjustment anyway just to be safe...

Anyhow, I still have an offset steeering wheel even though they did the adjustment...I guess some xb's have the wheel problem, others don't...After awhile I honestly don't notice it that much, and I've gotten used to it :)

Best of luck to you guys getting this problem corrected...Please post a reply on how it was fixed if you get it accomplished :)

DAN

The vehicle can be within alignment specs and the steering wheel can still be off center.
What they do is use a device to lock the steering wheel on center.Usually against the seat or on the floor.It is a device that will hold the steering wheel center while they do the adjustment.
Once they get the steering wheel where they want it,they will take Toe and camber readings.The toe is really all that is asjustable.Camber can be adjusted but takes a little more work and most places the person doing the alignment wont do it because the vehicle maker doesnt make camber adjustments easy anymore.
The Toe is usually what causes pull.
The Toe may be within specs when your steering wheel is at a certain angle.But when you put the steering wheel straight,it may be a little off.To make the steering wheel stay in the center,both tierods on each side of the vehicle must be adjusted.Take in to account that usually the adjustment will be made to american specs because we drive on the right side of the road.The said road usually has a crest and leans to the right for water runoff.So alignment adjustments will be made to keep the vehicle tracking straight on a crested road.On a completely flat road,you may notice the wheel a little offcenter.But it should not pull on a normal road and your steering wheel should be straight.
Umm,did you all understand all that!?? :wink:
Its kind of a happy medium type thing.

To fix these problems the person doing the alignment needs to understand HOW to properly align this car. First off, a 4-wheel alignment is incorrect for this car. The rear suspension is a torsion beam with toe-correcting bushings and this allows the rear wheels to actually turn a little when turning. The proper alignment is a 2-wheel centerline alignment (NOT thrust line) and care should be taken when driving on the ramp. Don't turn onto the ramp as the rear wheels will not be in their normal orientation. Back straight off the ramp as far as possible and then pull straight forward onto the ramp to settle the bushings in the neutral position. As stated, toe is the only easy adjustment to the front end, but up to about a degree of camber can be adjusted with camber bolts. Camber and caster won't be off unless something is BENT. MODERN alignment machines (find a Hunter machine with Win-Toe) dont require holding the steering wheel when adjusting toe, so you just get in the car and set the wheel perfectly straight, and then begin the Win-Toe adjustment and the wheel centerline will come out exactly where you set it to begin with. If the dealer says they don't have the specs in their machine (and they very well might not as Hunter is notoriously slow with new-model updates) the specs are online in TIS in the repair manual under steering. They can be manually loaded into the machine (yeah, it sucks but somebody has to do it) to do the alignment. Warranty will cover this up to 12k mi. If the dealer doesn't want to do it it's time to find a better dealer. Also, with the steering geometry of most modern cars, alignment issues are rarely the cause of pulling. Sure the tires will wear funny and the steering wheel centerline will be off, but the car will track straight down the road. The most common cause is tire-pull. Belt seperations ot tire conicity (the tire rolling under load in a cone-shape due to differences in sidewall thickness or stiffness). Find a shop with a Hunter 9700 tire balancer that measures road-force under load and it can locate a tire with excessive road-force and sometimes this can be corrected by phase-matching to the wheel to reduce road-force to an acceptable level. Some tires are just bad, even new ones .Hope this helps......~~~~~~~~scott

i wish our shop had new hunter machines

clean shop, making loads of dough with ghetto machines.... :cry:

we haven't had any scion complaints yet but since i read this, we wont overlook this steering wheel off center problem

am i the only one who's steering wheel seems to be to the right a few degrees? i read this post before i got mine and expected it to be cocked to the left only to find out the opposite. ill be goin down the interstate and hold the wheel straight and veer off to the left kind of quickly. i dunno, it's a 5 speed so i lean to the right on my invisible arm rest so it isn't that big of a deal, just finding things wrong on a brand new car kinda gets to you.

ben

No problems here, steering wheel is perfectly centered, and no alignment issues. Maybe I am lucky?

Wow k4kas and Scott, I think you both told me more than I wanted to know. I had no idea alignments were so complicated. As far as that crown of the road thing, sometimes I can tell when the road is sloping right and it seems like I have to move the wheel left to compensate. But like I said, I can be driving on a flat road and still notice the wheel tending to the left. Even on the highway when I'm on the far left side of the road (in the fast lane) where you'd think the road would be curved the other way (to the right so rain could drain into the median as opposed to the shoulder on the right) you would think I'd have to hold the wheel a little to the right to keep the car from tracking off to the left of the road, but instead it seems like I have to hold it in the center. It's strange...it seems like I would notice the crown thing with other vehicles but I haven't. I guess I'll try another dealer. If I do and they find something wrong and say I had to pay for it, couldn't I sue Toyota for denying assistance with a problem covered under the new vehicle warranty? I don't care...I just want someone to fix the problem. It just doesn't seem normal for a new car to do that.

As for the streering wheel issue, there's a TSB for that adjustment.

Do you have a link to this TSB? I would at least like to print it out and see if the dealer will fix the problem.

BTW > My steering wheel sits to the left a little as well when traveling straight :?

Mine pulls to the left but the steering wheel is straight for the most part.. its been like since i drove it off the lot.. the dealer told me they will fix it on my first oil change..

just got back from another dealer i thought i'd check out.. had a top of the line hunter alignment rack.. nice.. first dealer didn't align the car correct..camber, toe were all off the chart, they were so bad.. steering wheel was off 15 degrees.. but first dealer told me to "live with it.. that's as good as it gets".. what a joke.. anyway i can see why i dropped 5 mpg in fuel economy! so that's all fixed, steering wheel is perfectly centered..

I'd check the scion dealers around your area (whoever is reading this) and see if they have a newer hunter alignment rack.. since that is what I believe really helped get the alignment correct.. car feels much more fun to drive now that the tires are rolling straight ahead ;)