Bicycle Mechanics - swapped out stems. now my front assembly wants to "settle/stop" in the center?

so i installed a cinelli stem on my bike, but thats beside the point. after i put things back together and everything was said and done, on the bike ride home from the shop i noticed the front wheel/assembly wants to "settle" in the straight forward position. it turns freely just fine, but if the bike is lifted and the bars were spun slowly, it will stop dead center... did i tighten something too much? is something not true anymore?

help is appreciated, as this is somewhat annoying when riding. it feels like the wheel/spokes were way out of wack at first, but they were never touched.

thanks
Justin

Threadless or threaded headset? I'm guessing threadless as it sounds like the headset wasn't adjusted properly; the headset gets re-adjusted when replacing a threadless stem, but not a threaded one.

I would loosen the top cap and stem pinch bolts and re-adjust the headset. You want the top cap to compress the headset so that it doesn't feel loose when you squeeze the front brake and rock the bike back and forth, but not so tight that binding occurs at any point.

indeed threadless. and i went back and loosened the top cap headset bolt and sure enough it was FAR to tight. its all adjusted and fixed. i assumed this but wanted to just make sure it wasn't anything more then that,

thank you!!

Just to be clear: you must have the headset compression adjusted via the top cap bolt before tightening the stem pinch bolts. The top cap sets the compression; the stem pinch bolts maintain it.

You might have developed "indexing" in your bearing(s), where a divot/dent might be present on a bearing race and a bearing is settling into it.

Chombi