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02 Trans Am Pulls Right When Accelerating

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Old 07-12-2018, 10:16 PM
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Default 02 Trans Am Pulls Right When Accelerating

For the last month or so i've had this issue where my car will pull fairly hard to the right when i'm heavy on the throttle and then snap back to the left when I let out of it. The alignment is spot on so it's not that. It feels like it's something in the rear of the car causing the issue, but i've had it on the lift a dozen times and I can't see anything out of place. No worn bushings, nothing appears bent or out of place, bolts are torqued to spec, everything is greased as it should be.

The car is lowered on Hotchkis springs and Koni yellows, Hotchkis sway bars, Hotchkis panhard bar, Hotchkis LCAs, and LCA relocation brackets. All of that was done quite a while ago and this issue just recently started. Any ideas?
Old 07-15-2018, 08:08 PM
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Originally Posted by TheTinMan
For the last month or so i've had this issue where my car will pull fairly hard to the right when i'm heavy on the throttle and then snap back to the left when I let out of it. The alignment is spot on so it's not that. It feels like it's something in the rear of the car causing the issue, but i've had it on the lift a dozen times and I can't see anything out of place. No worn bushings, nothing appears bent or out of place, bolts are torqued to spec, everything is greased as it should be.

The car is lowered on Hotchkis springs and Koni yellows, Hotchkis sway bars, Hotchkis panhard bar, Hotchkis LCAs, and LCA relocation brackets. All of that was done quite a while ago and this issue just recently started. Any ideas?
I have no idea but a lot of questions.

If you can get the car on a lift, it might be worth checking all the wheel bearings for play, ball joints, tie rods, caliper bolts, etc.

Any issues with the rear end?

What condition are the tires in and are they correctly inflated?
​​​​​Different air pressure in tires can cause pulling. Tires with bad wear patters can,

Regarding alignment what sort of alignment are we talking about?
Full four wheel alignment that includes setting the thrust angle?
Often alignments about to "set toe & go"
Adjustable Rear LCA's are typically over looked at alignment unless mentioned to the tech.

My 99TA has had a bad alignment arfter the tech finished he was just too lazy to do the job correctly.
He said it was good and when pressed for the print out, produced an out of alignment print out both before and after. Whole thing had to be redone...and the lazy basted didn't correctly tighten everything afterwards. He insisted a full suspension rebuild was going to be needed to really get the alignment dead on.

The car went back and another motivated tech found all the issues and correctly aligned the 99 TA.
The correction required loosening the K-member and prying on it. A real alignment tech understands how it all works beyond what the instruments say. The 99TA's new alignment was nearly perfect.

What condition are the brakes in?
​​​​​Sometimes pads wear funny and bind.
Sometimes that happens because the calipers spread after a lot of hard braking.

​​​​​​
Old 07-16-2018, 06:10 PM
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Originally Posted by 99 Black Bird T/A
I have no idea but a lot of questions.

If you can get the car on a lift, it might be worth checking all the wheel bearings for play, ball joints, tie rods, caliper bolts, etc.

Any issues with the rear end?

What condition are the tires in and are they correctly inflated?
​​​​​Different air pressure in tires can cause pulling. Tires with bad wear patters can,

Regarding alignment what sort of alignment are we talking about?
Full four wheel alignment that includes setting the thrust angle?
Often alignments about to "set toe & go"
Adjustable Rear LCA's are typically over looked at alignment unless mentioned to the tech.

My 99TA has had a bad alignment arfter the tech finished he was just too lazy to do the job correctly.
He said it was good and when pressed for the print out, produced an out of alignment print out both before and after. Whole thing had to be redone...and the lazy basted didn't correctly tighten everything afterwards. He insisted a full suspension rebuild was going to be needed to really get the alignment dead on.

The car went back and another motivated tech found all the issues and correctly aligned the 99 TA.
The correction required loosening the K-member and prying on it. A real alignment tech understands how it all works beyond what the instruments say. The 99TA's new alignment was nearly perfect.

What condition are the brakes in?
​​​​​Sometimes pads wear funny and bind.
Sometimes that happens because the calipers spread after a lot of hard braking.

​​​​​​
Everything has been checked on the lift at work. Ball joints, wheel bearings, tie rods, etc. Majority of my suspension is new.

The rear end has the typical whine of a 10 bolt and the posi doesn't exactly work as it use to which is what i'm thinking the issue probably is.

Tires have 1500 miles on them roughly, even wear, rears inflated to 35 psi, fronts 38psi. Shouldn't be causing that sort of pull.

The LCA's are of the nonadjustable variety and my alignment was done at a fairly reputable local race shop because my car won't go on typical alignment shops drive on lifts. Complete 4 wheel alignment, they even adjusted my pinion angle because it was a bit off so i'm pretty sure it's fairly thorough.

Brakes are also new on all 4 corners with brand new CTS-V Brembo's up front and rebuilt rear calipers. No evidence of sticking or uneven wear of the pads.
Old 07-17-2018, 04:20 PM
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Based on those details, I tend to agree it's probably the rear end.



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