You'll need a pitman arm puller to get it off. Whatever you do don't pound on it. It'll damage the steering box.

 

That sounds like a plan. Disconnecting the steering box from the rest of the front end linkage will help to narrow down the problem, or problems. I'm also glad to hear that you were able to notice a difference from your most recent efforts. As fonefiddy said, if you take the pitman arm off, you should use a puller, its a very nice little tool.

 

the thing that scares me the most is when you turn the wheel back and forth with the wheels off the ground it make a popping noise like if the king pins would be dry with no grease but it has grease. but its not the pins its in the box, and whats weird about it is if you turn it all the way to one side, its easy to either side but stiff in the middle, does that make any since to yall?

 

Did you try greasing the pins while the wheels were up?

 

i did grease them with the wheels up but did not see any movement in the process. the puller that you use to pull the steering arm is it a three or four jaw puller or a totaly different puller?

 

A pitman arm puller is called exactly that (ask for one in a parts store and they'll know what to get you), it is usually a solid forged steel "C" shaped puller with a tightening bolt in the midle that lines up with the center bore in the steering arm shaft.

 

It looks like you could use a 2 jaw puller, but don't try it. They're not strong enough.

Are you sure the pins are accepting the grease? When you grease them, where does it expel the grease from? Are they hard to pump up?

 

the grease expels between the bottom knuckle and the middle knuckle , and between the middle knuckle and the top knuckle, if that makes any sense. When you pump grease in it , it is very easy to pump. The popping noise that i hear is coming from the steering box, because when i had my wife turn the steering wheel and i put my hand on the steering box , i could feel the popping noise vibrate in the box.

 

i have another question about these trucks, what causes them when you turn the steering all the way to one side it raises the from of the truck to the side you turn it to, and if you turn it the opposite way it will lift the other side.

 

I think we are missing something after "raises the ______from of the truck"

 

the front of the truck. lol lol

 

Thats the caster angle. If you look at the king pin carefully, you will be able to see that it is "leaning" slightly to the rear of the truck, I think some cars also lean caster inward as well (I think). As far as I know, all four (or more) wheeled highway vehicles have this angle to some digree.

Basicly what happens is when the wheels turn off center, one of them tries to "lift" the front of the truck slightly and this effect gives the vehicle its self centering ability, at least, normally it does!

The caster angle also takes much of load off the tie rod (and the ball joints there in) by using the weight of the vehicle to counter the "drag" that the road produces that tries to pull the front wheels back as you drive forward.

In theory, a vehicle would try to track in a strait line while going forward even if the tie rod was removed. I tested this once on a scale model.

 

ok heres the up date on the steering box. today i jacked the front of the truck up again and removed the arm from the gear box, checked both sides to see if the king pins were stiff. both sides was easy to turn by hand back and forth, and no movement up and down, so all thats goods. checked the gear box its self and still the same way, hard to turn and making that popping noise. the reason for it making all that noice and so stiff is because the jack--- that had the truck before me had turned the adjustment screw in so for it was binding everything up. i had to have my wife turn the steering back and forth and turn the screw a little at a time until it finaly loosened up. now the steering is easy to turn and when you let go of the steering wheel it returns back to center. man i sure am glad i dont have to fork out money on a new gearbox not as of right now anyway lol. well i would like to thank david85 and fonefiddy for the help with this issue, and everybody else too. now for the next issue. lol lol

 

Right on man! glad to hear things worked out for you.

 

Glad to hear. Have you driven it yet?

Just make sure you keep an eye on it. Just to make sure it's up to snuff.