Thread: Help! What did I do?

I was coming up on a intersection, the light is green and I'm turning right. I slow down some but don't stop because it is green. The road I'm on dips down to meet the road I'm turning onto, then back up to the lane surface of this road. As I go through this dip at rough 25 mph in a turn I hear a pop/crack noise come from the front of my car.
When I straighten out to drive down the street my steering wheel is roughly 30 degrees off of center to the right. I just had an alignment and it was perfect now it pulls to the left while the wheel is turned to the right.
Then while parallel parking later it made the same noise while i was turning the wheel hard the other direction. This straightened the wheel out to a small degree but it is still pretty bad.
Since this has happened my steering feels kind of lose. I don't know if its in my head or in reality, but it also doesn't feel very strong, like it might break totally at any minute.

Did I eff up my steering column, or the rack or what?

Sounds like a problem with either of the two outer tie rod ends, or either of the two inner tie rod ends. Visual inspection would be the first thing.

Inners Are Fuked.

I agree with the inners. Could be your rack also... Like Ben said... get the car up take the wheels off the front and take a look. If anything.. take the tie rods off the knuckle and pull on them... if there is play then your inners and out side tie rod ends should be replaced.

Being that my wheel is screwed up to the right, could it be just the right side inner or outer? I ask because I just replaced my left side inner and outer maby a month ago.

I'm currently at college living in the dorms and real busy so i haven't had time to get anywhere that i could actually get the tires off and a good look at anything.

You'd be surprised Nathan but not everyone doing those alignments are (ASE) certified to do so.(Trust me on this) I would bring the car back to the same shop and explain the issue your having did not start until they did the alingment. If it is a reputable shop they should have no problems rechecking everything so long as you conduct yourself as a adult. Also is there any chance that your car is lowered with coilovers?

Hold off on taking it back to the shop that did the alignment until you verify that your suspension didn't take damage. Last thing you want to do is go in, tell them it's messed up, then have them laugh at you and try to get you to pay them to fix it. Based on what you described, I'm 99.99999% sure it's something suspension-steering related.

I guess it's possible if you had the alignment done recently, they aligned it incorrectly like Topdog said. It can be pointing in the right direction and all of the measurements can be in spec, but if the steering wheel is on wrong it's possible there were only a few threads holding the tie rods together... It's a long shot, but possible.

I think I'll get a chance to look at it on sunday when im at home. The shop that did the alignment was a Chevy dealer (we have a family friend who got us in the shop and the alignment done for a good price) that my dad knows the guys so I really don't think it would be that. It was the best alignment I've ever had. I'll check everything out though.

OK well i got it back into the shop that did the alignment and they found a bolt loose somewhere in the front end. They checked everything over again, aligned it and gave it back all free of charge. I didn't get a chance to talk to the guys myself because I had to go back to school and Dad brought it in, so I don't know what bolt or any other info about the problem.