98 S70 T5 - Tie Rod Issue

[BCorks]

Hi everybody, new member here. I have been following these forums for a while and I know somebody here will be able to help me. I own a 98 S70 T5, 208k miles.

To start at the beginning, I took on a job that was way too big. I needed to replace inner tie rods and outer tie rod ends (both sides), brake rotors and pads, and the CV axle on the passenger side (did the driver side about 6 months ago). Nameplate shows a 5, and the steering rack has SMI printed on it, so I ordered SMI inner tie rods. All parts looked identical to what came off, including lengths. Once I got started I realized that I also needed new sway bar links and control arms.

Basically I replaced all of these components, tried to put everything back together and realized I had an issue. It all looks fine, but it seems as if the outer tie rod end didn't fully seat in the knuckle, so it has a gap like this:

I tried to do a basic alignment so that I could just get it to a shop to have a professional alignment, but I noticed that the alignment seemed very different from the old components:

Old inner tie rod is on the left, with the nut threaded about one thread up from where it was tightened. New components are on the right, but the wheel is still flared out, meaning I need to open it up even more. I'm running out of threads!

Here is the other part of the issue - the gap (or lack thereof) between the outer tie rod end and the wheel when I turn the steering wheel:

This is before the hard stop is even reached on the other side, so it looks like this:

Which ends up causing this problem when I try to turn the wheel past about a single turn - a nice grinding sound:

No I didn't take this on the road, just tried to pull it out of the garage.

In my brilliance, I thought that the outer tie rod end not sitting all the way into its through-hole may be causing the problem - so I tightened it. Now the nut spins freely but will not come off. Uh oh.

Not sure if this is related, but I will share because somebody may know how doing this could have caused my problem. A few years ago somebody had "fixed" the strut assembly by replacing the struts but none of the other components, and they put the old bump stops back on, which have since deteriorated. Because I'm, well, a guy, I decided that yes, I could handle doing that too, so I rented a spring compressor tool and got started. Problem was that trying to take the nut off the top of the strut assembly only caused the whole shaft to spin, unseating the spring. I got the spring reseated but gave up on that part of the project. I will have to have a mechanic with air tools do that.

What do you guys think? Any ideas of things to try? Please help!

[Oreo931]

You installed the outer tie rods upside down and possibly backwards (wrong side). The stud should come down into the hole, not up through the hole.

[BCorks]

Thank you! I know that everything is on the right side because I kept the old parts next to the car. However, I never thought that I could have installed them upside down. Duh! Thanks for the insight. Lesson learned.