Steering: Non power: clunking steering rack

[calibano]

hello hello,

first of all I owe a huge shout of gratitude to mylittletony, who last year graciously
donated a b21 A for an engine swap in my '78 244. what started like a valve noise belied a can of worms and eventually his generosity saved the car. also thank you, mighty Clan, for your very precious, as ever, insights. car is now running beautifully if it wasn't for excessive oil consumption (piston rings are next on the line).

what I'm facing now is a clunking steering rack. I believe the culprit to be the upper side that goes into the u-joint, as per photo 1. my question would be: is it possible to swap that with a pas, later shaft, again as per photos 2/3?

these are easier to source. on the other hand, if anyone had a manual shaft of course I'd buy it instantly.

cheers,

leo

[Clifford Pope]

Just to clarify, you mean it is one of the universal joints in the shaft connecting the steering column to the rack? Or a loose splined joint as in your third photo?

If the joint is merely stiff in certain positions, have you tried cleaning it up and immersing in hot oil and then allowing to cool in the oil? This can sometimes draw oil into the bearings and free up a seizing joint.

If you are thinking of converting to power steering, I'm sure this can be done, but you'd need the appropriate suspension ball joint arms to bolt onto the wishbone ends. The manual version is straight, the PAS angled to change the caster angle. Plus steering pump bracket, and crank pulley.

[Bugjam1999]

Hi – I just changed my 1978 from manual to power steering, see my project thread for a few photos…

The later steering column will fit at the top (onto the steering wheel shaft) but not at the bottom (onto the steering rack shaft) as you can see from your picture three the manual/power steering rack shafts are different sizes. With the shaft off the car you should be able to twist the joint backwards and forwards and work some oil into it which might free it off, otherwise try Clifford’s suggestion above (which I hadn’t heard of before but will remember for another day, thanks)

If you can’t get the joint to free up, the easiest solution will probably be to send the shaft off to an engineering company to have the universal joint replaced. The joint on the shaft I took out of my car wasn’t great – I expect any replacement shaft is likely to have the same age related stiffness.

If you want to swap to power steering you’ll need to find a few things to complete as Clifford says, but it’s a relatively simple swap.

Cheers

[calibano]

many thanks for your advice clifford. it could be any of those since exactly localising the noise is not an easy task. all my untrained ears can say is that there is some play somewhere and that makes - maybe mistakingly? - assume that either the u-joint or the splined one might be involved, or both. those pics I have pilfered from the web and don't refer directly to my car, which however mounts an early rack identical to the one in the first shot. I cannot fix it myself so wondered if I could provide the part to my local guy to adapt the later one to the existing rack. I don't want to convert to PAS since I still retain usable arms and don't want to inflict extra work to the engine. my main objective is eliminating said noise.

bugjam thanks for your contribution, I have pmd you and look forward to talk in person in london whenever possible.

cheers to both,

leonardo