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My car has an extremely annoying pull to the left. If I take my hands off the wheel, the car will drift over to the left, starting very slightly pulling left then aggressively pulling more to the left quite quickly.

Now to try and remedy this I have had the following done at my local garage:

  • Tracking - front (before new tyres)
  • Four wheel alignment (before new tyres)
  • Four new tyres

The wheel on the car, sits 'off', as in it is not straight on the centre, it is like it is slightly turned to the right, and as you are travelling you have to constantly keep pressure on the wheel as otherwise it will drift over to the left and pull the wheel with it.

Hopefully that is enough information to go on.

Thanks.

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  • Welcome to the site. You drive on the left side of road, correct? If you're going down a street on the right side of the crown, does it pull to the right?
    – Pᴀᴜʟsᴛᴇʀ2 ♦
    Jul 3, 2017 at 19:42
  • Thanks, yes we drive on the left, and no there is no pull when on the right side.
    – James Hatton
    Jul 3, 2017 at 19:44
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    I had this once. Not confident enough to make it an answer, but it was due to a crack in the chassis near the front, passenger wheel causing some flex. The mechanic would set the alignment whilst the car was in the air, but when back on the ground the chassis would flex slightly, throwing it off.
    – MeltingDog
    Jul 4, 2017 at 3:29
  • Are you sure that it isn't simply the left hand camber on the road. Perhaps your mechanic has set the car up for mainland europe values. You could try swapping camber angles left to right?
    – Steve Matthews
    Jul 4, 2017 at 14:40
  • What specific model Kia do you have?
    – finleyarcher
    Aug 7, 2017 at 22:51

2 Answers 2

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Firstly you must check, or have checked that there is nothing else wrong with the vehicle.. Say like a binding brake, low tyre pressure, sticking suspension unit etc. Or a load of weight in one side of the boot.

If the vehicle is fine, I would say get the tracking done again, but perhaps somewhere else this time. I only say this as some technicians idea of tracking a vehicle are not as precise as anothers.

It is not unusual for a vehicle to pull or rather drift very slightly with the camber angle of a road surface, but it sounds like yours is drifting more than a tiny bit here.. so something is not right.

Assuming that the vehicle has not been damaged in an accident or harshly curbed.. If there is a problem with setting the correct track then checks must also be done on the.. Steering rack, ball joints, shocks, springs, hubs, wheel bearings, tyres, brakes etc, inc handbrake. Just to make sure that drag or friction in another area is not creating a tracking type issue.

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Does the car have electric power steering? I once had a car with very similar symptoms, also not solved by sorting the wheel alignment, and it turned out the ePAS sensor had gone out of alignment, and was constantly trying to 'help' me to turn left - spotted instantly when I jacked the car up and switched on the ignition, and the wheel flung itself to full left lock...

It was an easy fix too, loosen off the screw holding the sensor and adjust it until a multimeter read '0' (ohms, if I remember correctly) when there was no pressure on the wheel.

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    That sounds...scary
    – MeltingDog
    Jul 5, 2017 at 7:03

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