My steering wheel is **** eyed and blocks the light that shows if I have left my Emergency Brake on when I drive away. I seem to remember that some cars I have driven sound the seat belt alarm until the emergency brake is disengaged! Has anyone had this on their truck? Can someone tell me how to hook up the seat belt buzzer so it sounds until the e-brake is disengaged? I keep driving with the darn thing engaged. I adjust it so I can't drive with it on, then if I forget it one time it is over. It would sure be a great mod for me. Also is it possible to get the adjustable part of the tie-rods, the threaded part longer? I had it adjusted so that the steering wheel was centered just right, and then I took it into the shop to have camber and caster adjusted and the tech said that it was almost out of thread. I had forgotten that I had to adjust it that way to keep the steering wheel straight. But to have the buzzer sound if the brake is left on would be such a better way to go! 1981 Ford F100 Custom w/302 3 speed overdrive

 

I believe you have messed up your steering and it's not going to steer very well the way you have it, and it will turn tight one direction and take a country mile to turn it the other direction. You also run the risk of damaging your steering box, if it bottoms out before the steering linkage stops come together to stop the steering.

What you should do is drive the truck straight ahead and stop. Then take the linkage loose from the pitman arm on the bottom of the steering box (the rod that goes to the pass side of the truck).

After you take the linkage off the pitman arm, get in the truck and turn the steering wheel all the way one way till it stops. Then turn it all the way the other direction, counting the exact number and fractions of a turn. Take this number and divided by two, and start from one direction or the other and count this divide by two number and then stop. The steering box is now centered. If your steering wheel is not level, then you will have to take it off and re-clock it on the splines on the steering shaft till it's level, and the box is still in the same middle spot.

Once you get all that straightened out, leave the steering wheel centered up, and then get under the truck and adjust the tie rod ends like you did before to line up the linkage so you can get it back into the pitman arm. Doing this should bring your threads back in line, and also make the steering feel much better when driving down the road. The box has a tight spot designed in the center of it's travel, and it needs to be in the spot when you are driving straight down the road.

 

For the buzzer/parking brake.

Find the wire going to the parking brake switch. I believe when this wire is touched to ground(that's what the switch does), the light comes on. See if you can do that.

The seat belt buzzer works the same way. Go back behind the seat and find the seat belt wire. Touch it to ground, the light should light and the buzzer should go off like it would if you didn't wear the seatbelt.

If you get that figured out, then it's simple. Just tie these two wires together with another added wire. If you put your seat belt on, it will unground the seatbelt wire, but the added wire going to the parking brake wire will still be grounded if the parking brake is still on, making the seat belt light/buzzer and the parking brake light come on. That's the only down side to this mod, if you do not put your seat belt on, you parking brake light will light up also. You could put a diode in there to prevent that, but it will probably be ok with that little quirk in operation.

 

If this works, I will be in your debt. I can't tell you how many times I have found that I have been driving with my E-brake on!! One would think that remembering to disengaging the e-brake before driving off would be a no brainer. But I drive many Automatic transmission rigs also. Being as how the parking brake is disengaged automatically (pun) when drive is engaged, checking the E-brake isn't a habit that
muscle memory just takes care of. I will report back if this mod works. Am I the only one with a manual shift that has this problem???
Even if it doesn't work, Thank you much for the effort.

 

Not a down side at all Franklin 2! They watch seatbelts here like a hawk. In two years I can move back out of California and go back to Washington/Alaska where people are reasonable, cause there are not so darn many of them.

Thanks again for taking the time to work this mod out!!