Tie Rod Replacement Help

[07RageGT]

Good evening! well i messed up big time today, i bent my right tie rod, has anyone had to replace one? do i have to remove the airbox and battery to get to the inside rod end? Any help would be greatly appreciated, and yes i did use the search function oh and also looks like i may have tweaked the left ski as well

 

[J1635]

you should just have to take the cotter pin off the tie rod end nut, unscrew it, losen the jam nut and unthread the bent tie rod.use a marker and mark on the thread where its sitting so its easy to put back on. if i were you id also take the a arms off, doesnt take long and youll find out right away if you bent anything (itll be hard to take apart)

 

[4strokeluvr111]

Removing the tie rod is fairly easy as 1635 indicates. Removing one or both of the a-arms isnt easy if you havent done it before.

What did you do to bend the tie rod? When you say you tweaked then left ski, what did you do and why do you think its tweaked?

 

[J1635]

easy as in everything is on the outside lol. with the front end raised off the ground does it look straight on both sides? turn and feel right in the steering?

 

[07RageGT]

it happened unloading it from the back of my truck with a tri-fold ramp, the right side of the ramp is the fold up side and my carbide on my right ski caught it, folded up that section of ramp and caught the rod and bent it, the left ski looks tweaked in a bit cause it was jammed up against the box side a bit when this all went down, yea i feel friggen dumb. It seems to sit level on the ground so i don't suspect the A-arms are bent at all, I'm going to replace the rod and both rod ends to be on the safe side so just wondering how much of a pain that inner rod end will be to get at, was too late in the day and too pissed off to start taking things apart in the cold in the driveway.

 

[J1635]

you wont know until you put the new tie rod and ends in if there was anything else damaged without opening it up and looking, you would have to pull the breatherbox, battery and frame holder to get into the tie arm pivot bar, its pretty thick though so chances are the tie rod took the impact. without any pictures none of us will be able to give you a for sure answer. but your right to change the rod and both ends to be safe. Do a full steering alignment after your done, dont forget a bit of loctite and replace the cotter pins

 

[07RageGT]

yea looks like the rod took the brunt, the outer got bent a bit from me trying to straighten it out, it wasn't a hard hit, just hard enough to bent the rod, ill start pulling things apart once i get the parts in. Thanks for the help