1999 S70 Wheel moves when braking. Lower control arm bush Topic is solved

blandis · Post by **blandis** » 07 Jan 2016, 17:42

New issue last couple days on 99 S70 T5 with 160K.

Had new rotors/pads a few weeks ago. Drove fine until a few days ago. New issue is when I apply the brake fairly firm or harder the steering wheel moves to the left. When you let off the brake, steering wheel recenters. Always goes to the left and to the same spot... ie like from 12 o'clock position to 11 o'clock position. Light braking, or braking a low speeds wheel does not seem to move.

Regardless of how hard you brake, wheel goes to same spot to the left everytime. Car does no pull left like it is a brake issue. Car drives straight. No front end noise.

Ball joint? Inner tie rod? Wheel moving to the same spot each time leads me to think its something worn in the front end.

Thank you in advance for your help.

Post by **j-dawg** » 07 Jan 2016, 20:27

Steering components and/or alignment. Lift one side of the car, leave the other on the ground, and try to wiggle the wheel holding it at 9 and 3. If you have a worn ball joint, you may be able to see the play in the joint itself. If you don't see it but you feel the wiggle, try it again on the other side - steering looseness will propagate its way across the steering system.

If you can't find a loose ball joint or tie rod, get your alignment checked. Misaligned steering on good components will still misbehave. But it seems unlikely that you'd suddenly have out-of-spec alignment without damage or wear in a steering component.

Post by **JimBee** » 07 Jan 2016, 21:01

When mine did that it was shot left side lower control arm bushings.

Post by **cn90** » 07 Jan 2016, 21:43

Check tire pressures.

biohazrd76 · Post by **biohazrd76** » 08 Jan 2016, 09:10

Also check subframe bushes, a bad cv joint can also cause in-out movement. If your boots are shot, this may be the case. Replacing boot and regrease will not solve this if you have lost any of the ball bearings, which I have seen.
Vince

Post by **FLXC90** » 08 Jan 2016, 17:16

+1 on LCA bushings. Does it "steer" in corners as you brake, release? My XC90 did, now it tracks straight and true no matter how hard I stomp 'em

blandis · Post by **blandis** » 13 Feb 2016, 19:42

Ended up being the drivers side control arm. Ball joint still good, but both bushings were cracked bad. Appreciate the input.