Hi guys I am new on this forum. I have a question I am hoping someone can answer. I just bought a 2001 f 250 cc 4x4 with the 7.3 liter engine. After a few days of driving the truck around everything seemed fine...that is until my wife was driving it one day and I was following her in my other truck. As we traveled down the road I noticed that the truck looked like it was sorta moving sideways down the road. Its kind of hard to explain but I could actually see a little bit of the drivers side rear fender of the truck and I was directly behind her. Its not bad but is noticeable if you are looking for it. I have seen other trucks like this before on the road that were much worse and wondered what was wrong with it and how do they keep tires on the thing. Anyone know what the problem is. I was thinking some how the frame may be bent or something. I certainly hope not but I dont know what else it could be...I am not an automobile mechanic by any means. I got a carfax report on it and it showed that it had never been wrecked. The truck has 80,000 miles on it and looks brand new inside and out. Any info would be appreciated

 

Interestingly enough I first thought the same thing when I looked at the Ford Vans. It was "dog walking", but then I saw it from the other side and it looked the same. Anyway all that to say if you measure the distance of the axle from inside of the wheel to inside of the wheel you will probably find out that the front axle is wider than the rear. Nothing wrong it was designed that way, as were the vans. As a previous chevy man that seems kinda weird, but rest assured it is OK.

 

Thanks for the reply man. I am really starting to worry about this. The replies are helping ease the pain though. Hopefully if there is anything wrong with it, it will be easy and inexpensive to repair.

 

Any alignment shop should be able to tell you if their is a problem, don't think it is worth the time and money if the truck is running "true" on the highway, I beleive it is all OK.

 

Sounds like the thrust angle isn't aligned with the centerline of the vehicle. You can take it somewhere and have a 4 wheel alignment done, which will show whether the thrust angle of the rear axle isn't right. Possible causes for this are worn shackle/leaf spring bushings or past collision damage the might have shifted the thrust angle off-center.

 

Sometimes a rear broken leaf-spring "center bolt" will cause a dog-track.

If you are dog-tracking, the problem will always be in the rear-end geometry, not the front.

Pop