Might have gone insane, will report back.

[drege]

Quit smoking again, took the terc out on a ricer road, hit the curves pretty hard, on an aggression scale of 1 to 10 I did an 8.9, pretended a pack of samurai monkeys were coming after me to steal my marbles, just as I took a right hand curve at roughly 45MPH/3800RPM in 3rd gear I heard a noise that snapped me back to reality.

Now it's really sloppy on the highway at 65+, more so than it was before.
Might be time to start replacing all the old worn suspension parts - wouldn't want to actually need to abscond someone or something and the car fails me.

Lets see; I need to pose a question don't I, otherwise this needs to go in off topic.
This a good start?
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/mog-k ... del/tercel
How many parts can I replace before I have to pay someone else to align it?

[Petros]

It depends what parts you replace, most you can replaced without having to align it if you put all the adjustments back to where it was before you took it apart. Many parts, such as ball joints, do not affect the alignment at all.

Or you can do the align it yourself for free! there is a thread over in the repair guilds section on how to D-I-Y alignment.

[ARCHINSTL]

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3171&p=24333#p24333
Have to copy and paste because of the color of the link.
Tom M.

[Mark]

I had an adventure with alignment recently. After removing/replacing the transmission a couple of years ago, my steering wheel wasn't centered and the car pulled to the right (even though I thought I was pretty careful to not change the position of the tie-rods and camber "washers"). I just put up with it until a couple of weeks ago and then I decided to try a few methods of checking the toe. I tried the 2X4 method and the tape measure method. I did it with the car normally on the ground and again with the front end lifted to see if it was different with the suspension unloaded. I did it all so many times over 2 days, and the result was all the same: about 1/4" of toe in. I equally adjusted both tie rods to center the steering wheel and the car still pulled to the right just like before. I noticed that the passenger side camber adjuster was pointed as far down as it could go so I gradually moved it/test drove until the car drove more or less straight when I took my hands off the wheel. It now pulls very slightly to the left. I tried swapping around the tires and it made no difference.
I decided to take it in for a proper computer alignment to check and see if I was way off. Because of the adjustments I made, the cotter pin-style wire that locked the crown nut in place on the outer tie rods were rusted and broken into small remaining pieces so I just stuck one of the pieces in the hole on each tie rod and assumed that the alignment shop would replace them with new wires when they made adjustments.
Unfortunately, the small, independent, local places were booked up for a couple of weeks so I cringed and went to one of the big fraud chains. I made a point of talking to the guy behind the desk about how I had already made some adjustments to the toe and camber and the components themselves were fine. This was to let them know that I sort-of knew a bit about cars and to prevent them from trying the "Your tie rods are worn and need to be replaced or you will die. We can do it for you for about $650" trick. That happened to me before.
I came back a couple of hours later and the guy showed me the computer print-out. It said that I actually had toe-out on the front wheels. This was surprising since my repeated measurements at home showed toe-in. They said my camber was already fine. They said the pulling slightly left issue couldn't be fixed by adjustments and that the only solution was new tires (even though swapping mine around made no difference). I drove home and it felt just the same (pulling slightly to the left). I looked under the car and the rusted fragments of wire were still in the tie-rod nuts. This made me suspicious that the tie-rods were never adjusted at all.
Anyway, my point of this big rant is that proper alignment is one of those magical things that may not actually be possible to realistically achieve. I'm pretty sure shops just use it as a tool for generating fraudulent income. I'm also not confident that I can do it properly myself since accurately measuring fractions of a degree with string/lumber/tape measures is pretty unreliable.

[dlb]

man, that's a bummer mark.

i've had great results using keith's toe method (viewtopic.php?f=7&t=2273) on probably half a dozen vehicles now. it can take a number of adjustments to get it just right but i've always finished with almost zero toe and no pulling. oh wait, that's not true. my wife's civic pulls slightly to one side despite being toed correctly but it hasn't been severe enough to take it to a shop to get the camber/castor checked. so i'm about 5/6 so far.

[Mark]

My problem with the 2X4 and tape measure method is that it will give you a basic idea of how much toe-in or toe-out you have (although the shop's alignment printout seemed to show the opposite of what I measured). It doesn't tell you if both wheels are pointed at that angle evenly. Pulling to the right or left isn't much of an indication of correct toe, since camber has a huge effect on this as well. You could have perfect toe-in, but the steering could still pull one way or the other. I tried the string method, which lets you see the angle of each wheel independently, but I couldn't get the string to lay flat against the side of the rear wheels. Either the rear wheels have severe toe-in or the front wheels stick out farther than the rear ones.

[ARCHINSTL]

I also used keith's method back in '07 when I installed evverthang new and checked it when I got the Daisy wheels and new tires in '10 and it was the same!
I tried the string method and gave up.
I will use keith's method again this Summer.
Tom M.

[dlb]

My problem with the 2X4 and tape measure method is that it will give you a basic idea of how much toe-in or toe-out you have (although the shop's alignment printout seemed to show the opposite of what I measured). It doesn't tell you if both wheels are pointed at that angle evenly. Pulling to the right or left isn't much of an indication of correct toe, since camber has a huge effect on this as well. You could have perfect toe-in, but the steering could still pull one way or the other. I tried the string method, which lets you see the angle of each wheel independently, but I couldn't get the string to lay flat against the side of the rear wheels. Either the rear wheels have severe toe-in or the front wheels stick out farther than the rear ones.

the tercel's rear axle has a narrower wheel base than the front. i noticed this the last time i looked in an owner's manual. same thing on my corolla, same on my wife's civic. i guess it's a common thing. it will obv impact the string method.

for camber on tercels, i just just set the adjusters so they are about halfway, and the same on both sides. i've never looked for camber adjusting on other cars but i'm guessing that is the problem on our civic that still pulls a little.

you're right, adjusting the toe is only one aspect of alignment. i have looked online for how to check and adjust camber at home but haven't found anything yet. generally though, i have found that toe has been my biggest source of alignment problems. i'm actually aligning a '90 integra for a friend right now, using keith's method. got to go test it now.

[drege]

Just had a look, passenger side sway bar bushing looks considerably off center, wiggles a little too much - this should account for a tendancy to wander across my lane at speed and needing to drive woth both hands on the wheel. She's not safely drivable till I can get her front end tightened up a little.
Thanks for that thread link archinstl = viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3171&p=24333#p24333 Its what lead me to look at the sway bar, I'd have thought balljoint or stering knuckle. Though I'm sure those are just as old they seem to fiunction at the moment.
I do have shuddering axel on the right side, hopefully its cause excessive travel in the lower control arm from worn sway bar bushings throwing the tripod joint out of center or something.

God I want to smoke.

[drege]

These!
From viewtopic.php?f=7&t=7481&p=79257&hilit= ... ngs#p79257

Are they really that hard to find as it seems to be from here; viewtopic.php?f=16&t=6438

[teranfirbt]

I was able to order them by googling the part number and direct ordering from a dealer, I think it cost ~$80 for all of the rubber bushings, new sleeves, and new lock nuts. I coated the bar under the sleeves with moly grease to try and stave off rust issues, luckily mine only had surface rust.

[dlb]

there are also polyurethane versions available. there a few threads on them around here somewhere. i think mad marx got some. IIRC they were cheaper than the regular rubber toyota bushings.

however, be aware that polyurethane bushings must be greased regularly: http://www.suspensionconnection.com/blo ... e-bushing/

[drege]

At this point I'm just trying to source ANY sway bar end bushings. Seems I can get the frame bushings all day, but no parts stores seem carry what I need.
Can someone lead me to water?

[jimcrazy]

try these guys http://www.jayracing.com/superpro-c-54_ ... 36410.html

[drege]

I'm afraid this is yet another example of parts scarcity for the SR5.
Maybe I'll pull one off and try and get close to size/diameter. FML!