gearbox or tie rod end???

[kevs250]

for about a year now my trucks steering has been loose and has a lot of play in the steering. a freind said it was my tie rod ends and the guy at the auto parts store says its my gear box??? and i was lookin in LMC truck and they have the center link, drag link and the outer tie rod for under about $150. soo wat is it??

[fordman]

the steering box can be adjusted to take some slack out. the tierod ends can be checked by shaking them to see if there is any slack in them as well as the rest of the parts. the king pins can be checked by jacking up the truck and trying to move the tire in and out at the bottom and top. of course that could also be some wear in the wheel bearing too that you may find. then also check the rag joint between your steerting shaft and steering box.

or you could take the truck to a alignment shop and tell them you need it checked. before it is aligned

[QC]

I'd agree with your friend. Check the tie rods.

[FORDification]

I'd find out for sure where the slack is before you start plopping down your hard-earned dollars for parts you might not need. I'd get the front end up off the ground and then have a friend sit in the cab and turn the wheel back and forth while you get underneath and try to find the slack. I'd especially check out the rag joint and tie-rod ends first. If those appear to be OK, and definitely if you can wiggle the wheel quite a bit before the Pitman arms starts to move, then suspect the steering box.

[flyboy2610]

What gear box do you have? Is it MS or PS?

[kevs250]

its power steering....ill check my tie rods and jack it in the air this weekend when i have some time. but yaa its true i really dont want to start puttin down big bucks for my tie rods when there isnt anything wrong with them. soo is the steering box adjustable??

[rjewkes]

Good news abut the left outer tie rod price, do a disk brake swap up from a 73-79 and the Left outer tie rod from autodrive is only 24.00 buck but use our old ones and depending on serial number you'll shell out 57-67 bucks plus tax.

i remember two years ago the left outer was only gonna cost me 19.95 plus tax at auto zone. Now they want 67.00 bucks but it is moog.

[darics]

I have the same problem with my converted ps in my 2wd F250. I have a lot of play in the wheel even with the engine off. I'm assuming that this means the box is bad. Is my assumption wrong?

[mcarlson11]

I also have the same problem, and I have already checked the tie rods, center link, rag joint, put in new wheel bearings, suspension bushings, and all. My conclusion is that it is the steering box. I have about 2.5 inches of play in the steering wheel.

[FORDification]

It's not much more work to change "assume" to "diagnosed". Find out exactly what it's causing the slack by the process of elimination.

Get the truck in the air and check for loose steering linkage pieces, starting with the tie rods, by grabbing and shaking them. Have someone in the truck turning the steering wheel back and forth and check for looseness in the linkage that way as well. If those look good, then check out the rag joint. It often looks good but is about worn out. Have someone turn the wheel back and forth while you watch the rag joint and see if there's any play there. If that checks out too, then move onto the kingpins...see if there's any looseness there. If those check out, you've pretty much eliminated all the other possibilities and it's a safe bet that it IS the box....but you can check that by having someone turn the wheel back and forth while you watch the output shaft (Pitman arm). If there appears to be excess travel there, then you've found the problem. You can tighten it up in small increments (3-5 in/lb at a time) until it feels tighter. Don't go too far though.

willowbilly had some good insight on this subject back in this thread, where he stated:

In my experience, tightening the slack seldom fixes the problem. It is the Pitman shaft bushings usually. If you can grab the rag joint and rotate the shaft back and forth, you will see the Pitman shaft move side to side before it starts to turn. Unfortunately there is no replaceable bushing. It is machined into the housing. You could probably take it to a machinist and have them bore it out and make a new bushing to fit your worn Pitman shaft.

I've had some parts trucks that were obviously driven with bad steering linkage components....the joints hadn't been lubed, gone dry, and then started wearing out from metal-to-metal contact. I also just pulled a Pitman arm of Saginaw box last weekend and found that I could wiggle the Pitman arm around on the end of the shaft, back and forth and up and down. Turns out the Pitman arm splines had worn considerably, allowing some slop there. Kinda hard to see in this picture, but here it is anyway:



This might have been caused by someone not following up on a repair job. If a Pitman arm is removed for whatever reason and then reinstalled, you should come back a few days later and retorque the nut, since the Pitman arm will creep back up the output shaft's splines a bit. If this is what happened and the owner didn't retorque the nut, it would've been loose, causing it to wear prematurely.