wandering
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Elder User
Joined: Feb 2004
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From: Fort Rucker, AL
wandering
I've recently coverted my '69 to power steering. She hunted for the ruts before but now it's ridiculous. How much can I adjust the worm gear until it's too much? Is there anything else I can do besides a stabilizer?
Elder User
Joined: Mar 2004
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From: SOUTH CAROLINA
adjust it until you have about a 1/2 to 1 inch of play in the steering wheel. dont force the screw to tighten. it could pop the seal on it then its gonna cost money to fix it. also check the rag joint. any slop in the front suspension is going to add to the play in the wheel so check that it is all in good shape before you make any changes to the box.
Posting Guru
Joined: Mar 2003
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From: nevada
You might want to have your alignment checked. First jack the truck up and have someone turn the steering wheel while you look underneath and look for anything suspicious. Tie rods, drag link, connecting link, etc. Also grab the top and bottom of the tires and see if theres any movement in or out. Loose wheel bearings dont help. It all adds up. A stabilizer will firm things up, but if you have anything worn out, it can only do so much.
Junior User
Joined: Jan 2005
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it took being on a lift to be able to observe slack where the tie rod and pittman arm connected. It even had the cotter pin and grease to give the appearance of a tight union, but after turning steering wheel back and forth it was observed that the movement was not immediate like it should be. This is a taper fit and can be missed that is not seated all the way.
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Joined: Jul 2003
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From: Montana
To check for worn king pins, jack truck up lifting the front suspension I-beam to raise front wheel off the ground. Grab the top and bottom of the front tire, and push at the top and pull at the bottom, then do the opposite: pull at the top, and push at the bottom. Any free movement should be visible by feel, and by looking at king pin while pulling back and forth.. Any movement means you should rebuild the king pins with new bushings, etc. The truck will run a long time on worn king pins if you don't want to spend the money.
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Joined: Feb 2004
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From: springfield,or
i was thinking about kingpins the other day. say can a person just replace the plastic bushing by taking off the caps of the kingpin and replacing them, without taking the actual kingpin out. the only problem i could see to occur is the load bearing might need replaced too. but then that might not cause problems either i don't know, its just that those kingpins are hard to remove.
