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I am installing a new steering column and replacing the rag joint with a double u-joint in my truck. The front clip is a 1970 LTD frame. The LTD frame is a little wider than the original so the steering box sits further left. To get it to connect, the PO had the column and rag joint at an angle that was just not good.
The double u-joint connects between the two but the angle is a bit too steep. I need to move the steering box out from the frame about 1/2" to reduce the angle for the double u-joint.
Is there anything special about the spacers that are placed between the frame and the box?
Once moved out does the pittman arm have be re-positioned to compensate for the difference?
On some boxes the pitman arm can be re-clocked on others it can't. Shorten the steering shaft and add one extra joint, you don't need three, it should not take up any more room and I would consider it safer than spacing out the box.
I don't think the shaft can be any shorter. It just comes out of the firewall now. The box and shaft are only about 5-6 inches apart. As you can see in the pic the angle is too tight. Borgeson says not to exceed 60 degrees.
I think I could get it there if the box was over a little but I definitely don't want to make it unsafe.
I don't have any pictures, but if it were me I'd use a section of exhaust tubing or electrical conduit about the size of one of the billet column floor mounts, cap it off on ne end and holesaw a hole the size of the column in the cap. holesaw or grind a hole in the floor plate for the tube to fit through. Shorten the column enough to allow for a shallow angle on an intermediate shaft with 2 U joints Slide the mount tube thru the floor plate an appropriate distance and angle, and weld to the floor plate. Bolt the column support to the mount cap and install the column. Look in my gallery at the frenched radio antenna mount I installed and imagine it larger and inverted.
The inner shaft is flattened at the end. When I cut it how do I flatten it again. It is a hollow shaft and I am afraid the wall thickness may be too thin to grind it flat.
Find a piece of flat or square stock that fits inside your shaft now to act as a die, then cut your shaft to desired length, insert your square/flat stock and hammer the tube to to shape with your "die" inside the tube.
Not sure how that can happen if the solid DD shaft is welded to the hollow shaft and the pin fits tightly and is welded on both ends. I would rather have that than a coupler with set screws, looks better too. I have plenty of GM setups here with a DD solid shaft that fits into a hollow DD tube, not welded together, they are the location for the lower column to collapse in an accident.
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