Anyway to Tighten Steering?

[sbveenker]

I have a 1994 Bronco with 35's and a 6" lift. I have replaced tie rods and ball joints. My steering is pretty sloppy. I've heard that you can tighten up steering boxes on some cars. Is there anyway to do it on these?

 

[Blue beast]

Are all the bushings tight and not overly dry rotted or cracked or over expanded and squished too far? There can be too much play in the

ttb beam bushings jack it up and try prying with a long bar and see how much they move also the radius arm bushing can make for a

loose feeling. What pressure are you running in your tires? try dropping the pressure 2 lbs at a time and see how it feels!!

 

[Broncobill78]

I have a 1994 Bronco with 35's and a 6" lift. I have replaced tie rods and ball joints. My steering is pretty sloppy. I've heard that you can tighten up steering boxes on some cars. Is there anyway to do it on these?

No, not really. On some steering boxes there's a large ***** w/a jam nut sticking out of one end but goofing around with it doesn't really net you any gains. If you've checked *everything* else and it's still loose then you can replace the box. I went that route with a 78/79 and had excellent results, the only problem is the expense. A rebuilt box cost me $450 10 yrs ago and I doubt they've gotten any cheaper. If you do go that route I'd suggest getting the box from K-bar-S or Jeff's Bronco Graveyard or one of the other Bronco vendors just because they usually know it's going into a truck and have it rebuilt correctly. I bought mine from Jeff's and found out while talking with them that in addition to all new internal parts the main shaft of every rebuilt box was X-rayed beforehand to ensure that they were using a good part w/no cracks (not always a guarantee though because the one I got developed a huge scarey crack right above the pitman arm about 7 wks after I installed it, but to their credit Jeff's replaced the box per their guarantee. They ******* & moaned about it but I got a new box within a week and had no more steering problems after that)

 

[Broncobill78]

Gosh dude, My bad. I completely zoned out on this once I started remembering all the bull$hit I went thru with my steering box and I got tunnel-vision and forgot about the rest of what I had to do to straighten out my steering.

If you've gone thru your bushings and tie-rods, drag-links and whatnot and everything is new or in super-good shape then you'll want to check with the folks at Borgeson. I'm not for sure if your truck has a rag-joint like the 73-79 trucks but even if it doesn't the steering joint is a definate source of slop and a frequent point of failure as well as the cause of much frustrated hair-pulling. Replace the joint with a new & high-quality unit from these folks and if it doesn't fix your problem it will certainly get you part-way there.

http://www.borgeson.com/TruckProductFord.htm