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Hello- > It seems as though the driver side inner tie rid end, is just beginning to > show signs of wear, on the 71 Type3. > It also seems that this particular tie rod end is not available anywhere. Yep. I was able to find one bent the opposite direction, but that's not very helpful :-). > This is the rod end that has the slight angle built into it, looks like its > bent but is actually there to get parallel alignment with the pitman arm. The parallel alignment isn't necessary to maintain steering geometry. If you make the front suspension into a diagram and "zoom out," it just functions as a link between two points. The only reason it is necessary is to prevent it from "topping" or "bottoming" out and binding on the tie rod. I've simply used the straight one before, too, and to date haven't had a problem. My best guess is that VW did it that way so that if someone had things REALLY out of wack (old car, hit, etc.), it still wouldn't bind... a "margin of error" thing. Take care, Shad Laws LN Engineering - Aircooled Precision Performance http://www.lnengineering.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ List info at http://www.vwtype3.org/list | mailto:gregm@vwtype3.org