Hi my wife has bought a 56 plate GP 1.3 Multijet 75 BHP Active 20k miles from a local non dealer garage. The car pulls to the left and she has to correct the steering wheel on straight roads. Her wrist is sore! Gone back the garage and they checked the tracking which is spot on but they change the front tyres for new, it has made little or no difference. Feels the same in city mode also. Going back to the garage tomorrow and will test drive it with the mechanic, any thoughts as to what other mechanical issues could be effecting it? Brakes binding, power steering sensors, steering column fault etc. Be good if I could give the guy some suggestions.

Camber of the road...

Grande Punto's are sensitive to road camber (the run - off for rain water) but this can be minimised by having the tracking done properly, (all 4 wheels with a laser) rather than the simple front wheel only method.

i had this issue on my car. I thought it was the tracking so asked the service guy i know to have a look at the tracking for me.

It turned out to be my brake calliper not releasing properly. This was cleaned and the car was fine. It has started do pull to the left again so im gonna get a proper tracking done and get the calliper cleaned again if need be.

Ffoxy said:

Grande Punto's are sensitive to road camber (the run - off for rain water) but this can be minimised by having the tracking done properly, (all 4 wheels with a laser) rather than the simple front wheel only method.

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4 wheel is pointless on a GP as nothing can be changed on the rear wheels.

punto_matt said:

4 wheel is pointless on a GP as nothing can be changed on the rear wheels.

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Get them to check for a broken spring, probably nearside, this may cause a bit of lean and thus pull to one side.

punto_matt said:

4 wheel is pointless on a GP as nothing can be changed on the rear wheels.

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But its brill for exposing duff wheel alignment if its been kerbed at any time in its life eh Matt?

On the rear wheels?

I wouldn't mention road camber, they'll just say, 'yeah, that's what it is', and there's nowt that the garage can do to fix that.

Dropped the car this morning and went out with the technicican who accepted that it was pulling to the left but did say that camber is camber and there is not much that can be done.

The car has had alloys fitted in the past and now have 185/60 R15's which are slightly bigger the the 175 originally fitted. I have looked in the logbook and the car can come with either 175 0r 185's so I am not sure it this would make a difference, may make the steering a little heavier I guess.

I will have to see what happens today. Great website.

ECU POWER STEERING PUMP, mine did the same 06 GP pulled to the left then later made grinding noises when turning to the right. the part is £517 quid!

Hello Matt.

I had the same experience with my M-Jet. I did all the tests (Camber, Calipers, Tyre pressure etc) I was in and out of the dealers for a few days with various explanations (some good, some not so good) as to what it could be:bang:. Anyway, long story short, I took their "head tech" out for a drive to show him how severe it was (I had to litterally steer in the opposite direction to keep the car true) it turned out to be a weakened (not broken) front left spring causing it (they had to phone round various dealers to find this out 'cos they had never seen it). So they replaced both my front springs (Under 3rd yr warranty) and that solved it.
This is just something else for you to consider. I hope it helps pal.

matt, take it to Desira in Norwich as they know the GP better than anyone around there.