Just bought a 2000 250 Crew cab. Overall ride is good and torque is
umphadelic. Only 200 miles and I dont know if I can go back.
One problem if you guys could shed some light. The steering wants to
follow the contour of the road or wander a bit. Also hard to steer when stopped or moving slowly. On a decent road you dont notice much. It has 315 75 16 tires and is lifted. The previous owner says 3" but it looks like more. The block under the axel looks to be about 6". What advantage does lifting a truck and bigger tires really give you besides it looks cool to some ? Could it be just do to large tires? The lift? Is this normal?

I think I'd rather have stock height and standard size tires. Is this an expensive
job to bring back to stock? Any ideas I will be towing and want everything safe.
I dont like that butt sucking vynil feeling when towing with the kids...
Thanks

 

<TABLE><TBODY><TR><TD vAlign=top width="100%">Welcome to .


Some lift kits can be hard on front end parts, especially with oversize tires.

Worn out Ball joints and/or tierod ends can cause the wandering you described. You need to get the front wheels off the ground to check the ball joints. Grab the wheel top and bottom shake it hard. Then grab the wheel front and rear and do the same, you should feel very little movement and no clunking sounds. The tierod ends can be checked with the tires on the ground with a helper shaking the steering wheel back and forth while you watch/listen at/to the joints.




It could be the steering gear needs some lash adjustment. You can loosen #6 below and give #4 a 1/4 to 1/2 turn clockwise, then retighten #6.
-or-

This is the procedure copied from the book:

• Adjust total on center load to eliminate excessive lash between the sector and rack teeth as follows.
• With the engine off, turn the steering wheel from full right stop to full left stop at least once.
• Remove steering wheel hub cover.
• Disconnect the steering gear sector shaft arm from the steering gear sector shaft using Pitman Arm Puller.
• Attach a newton meter (pound-inch) torque wrench to the steering wheel hub nut and determine the torque required to rotate the power steering gear input shaft and control back and forth across the center position (± 90 degrees).
• Reset the meshload only if the measured torque for total on-center load is less than 1.5 Nm (13 lb-in). If reset is required, loosen the adjuster lock nut and turn the sector shaft adjuster screw until the measured total on-center load torque is 2.0 Nm (18 lb-in). Hold the sector shaft screw in place and tighten the lock nut to 48-61 Nm (35-45 lb-ft).
• Recheck torque readings and replace the steering gear sector shaft arm. Tighten the pitman arm-to-sector shaft nut 230-310 Nm (170-228 lb-ft).
• Verify no binding condition in steering throughout full stop-to-stop travel.
• Replace steering wheel hub cover.

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=3 width="70%" border=1><TBODY><TR><TH vAlign=bottom>Item</TH><TH vAlign=bottom>Part Number</TH><TH vAlign=bottom>Description</TH><TR vAlign=top><TD>1</TD><TD>—</TD><TD>Outlet Port (Part of 3504)</TD></TR><TR vAlign=top><TD>2</TD><TD>—</TD><TD>Inlet Port (Part of 3504)</TD></TR><TR vAlign=top><TD>3</TD><TD>—</TD><TD>Identification Tag




(Part of 3504)



</TD></TR><TR vAlign=top><TD>4</TD><TD>—</TD><TD>Sector Shaft Adjusting Screw (Part of 3540)</TD></TR><TR vAlign=top><TD>5</TD><TD>3580</TD><TD>Steering Gear Sector Shaft Housing Cover</TD></TR><TR vAlign=top><TD>6</TD><TD>—</TD><TD>Lock Nut (Part of 3540)</TD></TR><TR vAlign=top><TD>7</TD><TD>3575</TD><TD>Steering Gear Sector Shaft</TD></TR><TR vAlign=top><TD>8</TD><TD>—</TD><TD>Control Valve Housing




(Part of 3568)



</TD></TR><TR vAlign=top><TD>9</TD><TD>3D517</TD><TD>Power Steering Gear Input Shaft and Control</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>




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When I bought mine it wandered all over the place. I was almost scary to drive on the freeway and you really had to pay attention. Tried the steering box adjustment and it didn't help. Just made the steering wheel tight and it still wandered like crazy.

Turned out it was bad upper and lower ball joints. The truck came from a cattle ranch and spent most of it's life on dirt roads and in pastures.

I replaced the ball joints with the Moog's and haven't had any problems since. I can now drive on the freeway at 80 mph with one hand, no problem. Wouldn't think of doing that before, it would have been disastrous.

Mine is liifted 4" and has LT285 75 R 16s on it.

 

As far as getting it back to stock hieght. Is that an expensive proposition? Something a a guy could do on a weekend? Where would I find stock parts
at good price? Wrecking yard ok for this kind of thing? Where the Moogs?
Thanks guys

 

Do I need manuals for this stuff? Any suggestions on good ones. Owners manual too.

 

Moogs can be purchased at NAPA.
Manuals can be downloaded at www.fordcds.com
The website even offers the DVD bit torrent file that you have to run a peer-to-peer client to obtain.