tangystang

I went to have my car aligned today, and the guy told me he could not do it because my inner tie was worn. He showed me he could move the tire from left to right. so my question is would this actually be the inner tie rod, or the outer going bad? I feel they are just trying to get money. I know one of them needs replacing. I could do the work myself, and they wanted like $360 for parts and labor.

What are your thoughts?

tangystang

and either way, whatever part it is, is it best to do both sides while I'm at it? They never said anything about the left wheel. So i'm guessing its fine?

dawson1112

You have to get the car up and see for your self where the movement is. It could be either of them. I would check both sides , and likely if one side is bad the other is not far behind.

petrock

+1. It could be the inner, outer or both. Its a very easy job. You do have to get an alignment afterwards through.

I would actually give your alignment shop some credit though. A lot of shops will do the alignment, charge you for it, and then tell you that the tie rods are bad. Then after replacing the bad part, you have to pay for another alignment… So thank the shop/mechanic for being honest with you…

Good luck...

Derf00

Ya, you are lucky the shop told you first before wasting your money on an alignment. if you need to replace one tie rod, replace them all. Once you get a worn tie rod, the excess play accelerates the wear on the others.

I dont know if the new edge models are like the s197 models but for s197 models, you need a special (expensive) tool to do the inner tie rods. You also need a pair of clamp pliers to reattach the new clamp to the inner tie rod bellow...another tool. Do some quick research on total cost for you to buy the parts and source the tools yourself and compare that to the price they gave you.

If you can rent or get the tool loaned to you by a local auto parts store, DIY. if not, the cost will be similar.

tangystang

Yeah I know I'm lucky they told me. The manager told me he can't do it until those parts are replaced, and of course I thanked him because that would have been a waste. but I don't have 300 to spend right now. I can do the job myself and then just go get it aligned afterwards.

Does anyone know what tools I need? Is it just the Inner tie rod end tool, and tie rod separator?

Thatsweetstang

You're lucky our cars are really easy to do, but just so you know a lot of the times with our older racks, is our rack internals go bad and it looks like our inner tie rods are bad. You really need to determin if your inner tie rods are truely bad or not. The correct way to check inner and outer tie rods is to leave the vehicle on the ground and with a buddy turn the steering wheel back and fourth only when it starts to grab. You don't want your wheels moving. Then grab the inner tie rod boot and try to feel the ball and socket joint and you'll feel it popping. Same with the outer. If the inner is popping then move the boot off and look at the inner and check again visually if it is popping or if the internal of the rack is popping. It's hard to explain typing :/. But that's what I would do first I've replaced a lot of mustang racks because the racks were bad not the inner tie rods. That's what I would do first. When you determin what is bad let me know and I can literally walk you through the inner tie rod installation with crescent wrench, some pliers, and a basic socket set and a hammer for the outer tie rod. Ps there is no requirement of a bad inner tie rod or outer for an alignment, meaning there is no spec so you can always do the alignment you'll just have your steering wheel possibly a little crooked but toe wear isnt going to be present, no way it'll go that out.

tangystang

Okay, thanks for all that. I got underneath my car today, took both front wheels off, and slide the bellows off the rack where the inner tie rods are and grabbed the rotor and caliper at 9-3 and moved it back and forth, and it is definitely the inner tie rods. the rod that goes into the socket looking piece that screws on (I guess) was moving in and out as I moved the wheel. it had a lot of play in it. So I bought the inner and outer tie rods and both driver and passenger. But I can't do it right now because autozone didn't have the right tool for it, and I don't have a wrench big enough to get that piece off. I think advance auto might have one though. I'll check that out tomorrow.

Thatsweetstang

As long as you have a socket set, hammer and some pliers you can get this job done. I guess you're gonna rent an inner tie rod tool. They are hit and miss on the right size you'll need just so you know now. I would invest in a good crescent wrench. I mean a good one, lower quality ones will open up and slip, which will strip what you are wrenching. When I put my bellows back on I just use a zip tie to hold it in place, been working for years for all my cars. Make sure to count how many turns it takes to take off the outer tie rod from the inner. Just to get you in the ball park of alignment.

petrock

Inner & outer tie rods are a fairly straight forward job. Not very complicated at all. There are a ton of video’s on YouTube about how to do this. Its a fairly universal job. I used a large adjustable wrench to get the inner tie rod off because the tool from auto zone didn’t fit. There is plenty of access to the hex-head of the inner tie rod from underneath, so it isn’t too bad. Avoid using a pickle fork to remove the outer tie rods. An easier technique is to use a BFH to hit the steering knuckle where the tie rod goes through (after loosening the nut on the tie rod shaft of course). A few good whacks and it should pop off.

Zip ties work pretty well holding the bellows boots onto the rack when your done.

Here’s a good video on a Ford Explorer.