Hello, all. treated my '85 F150 to a new Redhead steering box the other morning. Also did my rag joint at the same time. D splines on the box, so of course it only goes on one way. Before I changed the old, not loose but leaky box, the wheel was dead straight when driving. Now the wheel is a full 90* to the left when going straight. As I understand the truck has a D spline at the wheel, too.. but the pit-man arm is ALSO straight ahead. It's position is unchanged from the original box of course. Can a shop just re-align this, or am I missing something? That seems like a big difference to me to make up with the tie rods. I could make sense of 180* out, that would be the rag joint bolts done wrong. But not 90*.

 

I've zero experience with Redhead, nor have I had to do anything with my truck's stock steering box. However, on all other vehicles where I have worked on the steering, there is a precaution you must consider.

The gearbox must be centered when the wheels are straight ahead. With the gearbox output arm disconnected, you count the turns stop-to-stop and then count back half of that range from one stop. That puts the internal gears at the center of their travel.

Why is this important? The gear mesh is deliberately tighter at the middle of travel, typically an eighth of a turn to either side of center. This makes for more responsive steering while traveling straight, with less slop.

In a turn? When the gearbox is off-center, the gear mesh is deliberately looser. However, because of the caster action of the wheels themselves, the steering linkage pushes the gearbox output arm back towards center. You never feel the gearbox's extra slop because the centering action from the wheels is hiding it. This extra play helps reduce steering effort in a turn.

How your steering ended up so far off-center? Heck if I know, can't help there. But I'm almost positive your new gearbox needs to be physically centered with the wheels pointing straight forward. You can make minor tweaks at the tie rods, but the max this should turn the steering wheel is an eighth of a turn. More than that and the gearbox will be out of the tight mesh at the center of travel.

 

This is not uncommon to have the steering wheel cocked off centre with a steering box change. But 90° sort of says that something is not right. I would suspect the rag joint.
All the splined joints (Pitman. Sector shaft, steering wheel) are indexed so they will only go on one way. It would not hurt to pull the horn pad just to make sure the steering wheel is correct.

 

I don't think I have seen a wheel that was splined to go on only 1 way and now that I think of it or the input shaft on the boxes I have played with.

Are you sure the box is set to the center of the left lock & right lock.
Once that is done and both wheels pointing straight forward put the pitman arm on the out put shaft. The output shaft I have seen could be clocked every 90* IIRC
With the box set to straight and the pitman arm hooked up you can now hook the rag joint to the box making sure the steering wheel is set right.
This should get everything pointing in the right direction.
Dave ----

 

The sector shaft has flat on the splines that line up with the split in the rag joint.so the joint can be tightened See below.

Ford steering wheels have a double spline on the shaft and in the steering wheel and are usually index marked in addition

 

Well now I can eat my words LOL
I never had the wheel off the shaft on mine and it has been years since I had the box & shaft apart to remember the flat part.
Is the out put shaft have the 4 double splines so you can put the pitman arm on in 90* clock?
If so I wonder if the box was not set to center before the pitman arm was installed?

If the box was centered and the rest cant be installed any other way then he needs to check the tie rods to see if they can be adjusted to get the wheel centered or something is bent.

Most of the boxes& shafts I have played with have 2 letters
Dave ----

 

Hey all, delayed response is better then nothing I guess haha. The box was centered. Local shop took care of the wheel today, I guess I was overthinking it .. granted its my steering, so I digress. Few turns on the tie rod adjusters and we're good,

 

I see the flat spot on the steering wheel spline, but I can put my steering wheel anywhere I want anyway. In fact, that is what I ended up doing when I changed my steering box. It was off just a little bit, not 90 degrees though. I drove it that way for a year or two, but finally got tired of it and just pulled the wheel off and move it a couple of splines. I can see a factory tick mark, and mine doesn't line up anymore. But I seem to be able to put it anywhere I want. And my truck seems to be pretty much unmolested, except where I have molested it. I am talking about my 89 here.