lmaddelein

2000 RX300 Front Wheel Drive, 72K miles, 17K on Tires, newer brakes. Car drifts to left. Tried rotating and balancing tires, had 4 wheel alignment done, swapped front left to right, swapped back left to right, had 2nd alignment done. Had car checked by very good local Toyota/Lexus shop they verified problem and checked everything in the front end. They only thing they found was the engine and tranny mounts were close to needing replacement - I did not do that. After each and every "fix" listed above, car still drifts (not pulls) to the left. Any ideas?

kedmunds

Not to be getting too personal, but do you carry a lot of stuff in the back of your RX? Is any of it on the same side that you are on. Your weight plus the weight of any cargo could cause some of this.

Also, take a look at the lane that you drive in. Some of the highway lanes and sloped now to where my car drifts to the right if I am in the right hand lane and to the left when I am in the left hand lane. It's great for rain water run off, but tough on us when we drive these roads all of the time.

sktn77a

iTrader: (2)

If the alignment is perfect and the car hasn't been in a serious wreck, then this is a likely explanation.

Alexus02

my 2002 75k miles does the same thing. 4 wheel alignment is perfect, roadforce balanced wheels, new tires but still drifts left. I've ordered struts....keep you posted...

hypervish

The tires could be defective, most tires have steel belts and they can get damaged or be originally damaged from the factory. The steel belts can become "out of round" as we like to call it, but that rarely happens usually it's an alignment issue, or a caliper which is sticking but it sounds like those are ruled out so it may just be a defective tire.

Alexus02

new tires plus rotated side to side and back to front but still drifts to the left. will check caliper...but how?

hypervish

Even new tires can be defective, but once the tires are rotated and the car still drifts the same way ( in this case to the left) then you know it's not the tires.

Now, for checking the caliper. The first caliper to check would be the drivers side since it's pulling to the left, check the sliding pins to see if they are stuck frozen, and be sure to grease them while your in there. Then check the driver's side rear, and do the same thing.

There is also another way to check if the caliper is sticking, but it may not be as accurate. You can see if one of the wheels is hotter toward the hub than the other wheels, this would indicate that the caliper is sticking.

Alexus02

New Struts all round..drive is very stable and smooth now - no more bouncing when braking or at high speed. However, still drifts to the left despite a second wheel alignment after strut installation. I noticed it doesn't always drift left-just most of the time. When it doesn't if I apply the brakes it then pulls to the left. Could it be a brake issue? How do I test further or fix it?

code58

I did front end alignment in the course of my work (mostly body and frame) for quite a few years and I can say that I never had a pull or drift that I wasn't able to cure. A customer would be justified in not finding that acceptable and I don't blame them, I wouldn't either. EVERY job I did got a road test to make SURE there were no problems or discrepencies of any kind before I considered the job complete. My 1st inclination, from reading what has been done, is that it would likely be a caliper hanging up A LITTLE. I would check the temp of the rotor and caliper with an infrared temp gun after a good drive. IF it is hanging up, even a little, it will show a higher temp. than the other side. It is the only way to accurately determine that it is actually hanging up. Calipers DO hang up occasionally since there is NORMALLY nothing to actually retract the piston, like in a drum brake.

I would say the only reasonable fix is to put a rebuilt caliper on. I would buy from a quality source like Napa or Carquest to at least try and get a good rebuilt. There's a lot of junk out there.

Alexus02

thanks. checked temps on the rotors on both sides. about the same temp (170F). Not brakes so now I'm stumped!

wvuguy

My 99 RX300 drifts to the left. Today I removed disconnected the outer tie rods from the knuckle to check for the play. It seems like my right inner tie rod is bad. It feels extreemly loose. I am going to replace it this weekend and see if that fixed the problem. Will keep you guys updated.

code58

You're right, with equal temps there shouldn't be any caliper hanging, even slightly. There are ways to deal with that type of thing, but I don't want to post them here. A lot of unitized cars built in the last 20 years don't have either castor or camber settings, they are jigged correctly at the factory when they're welded up and shouldn't ever get out of specs. My experience is that those vehicles do quite well, but a lot can happen in the ensuing years and with NO adjustment to compensate, you sometimes run into a brick wall. The shop manual shows a little camber adjustment on the 2 lower strut mount bolts but I swear when I had my DIL's apart, I saw NO adjustment at all. Some of the cheaper Toyota's had adjustment there and the more expensive had NONE. An alignment shop will many times consider an alignment fine if it is within specs, but with one side at one end of specs and the other side at the other end, you can still have driving problems with it "WITHIN SPECS". You might check the inner tie rods as the poster above me noted. I guess it could cause a drift. I have replaced inner tie rods, but it is not a very problematic area at all.

JohnLX300

iTrader: (2)

My 1999 RX300 has this same issue @ 103k. I replaced struts, strut mounts, tie rod ends, cailpers, sway bar links, and ball joints.....still a drift to the left. Even with a perfect alignment.

code58

John- see my post above yours. There is actually very little to align in the front end on an RX. There is NO caster alignment, and though the factory repair manual shows a camber alignment by way of a SMALL adjustment on one of the 2 lower strut bolts, and more with the use of special bolts that have to be determined from a chart, I found NO adjustment at all on my DIL's via the 2 lower bolts when I had it apart. There are ways to cure the drift that are safe but not conventional alignment practice so I don't feel comfortable to post them here. (perfect alignment to most alignment people means "within specs", which may not do the job, but they'll think theirs is done).

wvuguy

Turns out my problem was the front left tire. I was looking into steering/suspension componets and overlooking tire pressure. Pressure was low enough to cause a drift to the left. Once i had the tire fixed, it seems to fine now.