Steering wheel suddenly off center to right

[safetyfast]

My son has been driving my '96 1500 4WD for the past week. Went to drive it today and the steering wheel is off to the right, about 2 o'clock when driving straight ahead. It was perfectly straight before. What should I check? FWIW, it already has a borgeson steering shaft and a heavy moog track bar. My son said he looked under it and the tie rods looked okay. Haven't had a chance to get under it myself.

 

[safetyfast]

So the only thing I see wrong is the driver side u joint is broken. I don’t see how that would cause the steering wheel to go off center though. Having a heck of a time getting the hub off so it’s going to soak in some PB blaster.

 

[Docwagon1776]

Did he hit a pothole or something hard enough to knock it out of alignment?

 

[safetyfast]

He said he hit a pothole, so it’s possible. You would think that would t do as much as some of the off-roading we do. When he gets home, I’ll have him turn the steering while I look at the linkage.

 

[safetyfast]

Fixed the ujoint and checked the rest out. One ball joint is a little loose. Tie
Rod a little loose at pitman arm and boot on center tie rod is torn. I guess I’m just going to bite the bullet and rebuild the whole thing. I still don’t see how that caused my steering wheel to suddenly be so far off center. The adjusters were still tight and locked down.
Are any of the kits that have all the parts any good? I don’t want to spend a fortune on what is just my farm truck/ winter ******.

 

[Skatulaki]

I've seen potholes that would break your wheel off. My guess is that in the area where you have bad parts , that you jumped some splines at one connection or another.

 

[Eclektq]

I did that way back by jumping a levee in an old C-10....But mine was more like 90 out....