Fixing the right problem?

[hex0rz]

After I got my lift pump situation figured out, I started driving the truck to work more since my road was in the middle of mud season.

 

Upon driving it more regularly, I noticed something that concerned me, ALLOT. 

 

The condition is created mostly when I go around corners. When I apply the brakes, I notice something strange also, but not sure if the two are related. 

 

Upon rounding a curve, if I go a little fast, enough to feel it in the seat of my pants, so to speak, it feels like all the sudden I hit ice. It's a warm sunny day, no ice. But all of the sudden it's like I lose some steering as if I hit ice. I end up correcting about 1/8th to 1/4 turn to stay on course. Scares the crap out of me. I do not get this condition if I'm going slow. I haven't tested low speed sharp turns either. 

 

I do get road wander. Steering wheel has about 1/8th turn slop. I have replaced the front steering components with moog.

 

Upon braking, the truck will want to pull one direction or the other. Enough that sometimes when I let off the brake, I've overcorrected too much.

 

Ive dumped quite a bit into the truck to keep it in road worthy condition. But something new has developed and I have refused to let anyone else drive it. Enough to the point ive taken it off the road until I fix the problem. 

 

Upon these findings, I have considered that it was my ball joints. They're still OEM and ive never been able to get grease to them. The zeros were seized up and the ball joints hardened with old grease. As we speak, the truck sits in the driveway in process of ball joint replacements with new moogs.

 

Before I started tear down, I forgot to check things using the tires. I'll do that after reassembly though. Other findings show that the steering components look tight with no slop using the steering wheel shimmy method.

 

Something that I did note is that at the pitman arm shaft on the steering box. It looks like it may be leaking. It also looked like the shaft in the steering box had some slop in it. Would there be a way to fix this or do I have to replace the box?

 

In summary, I know the ball joints need done. But im not 100 percent sure my symptoms match just the ball joints or if I have a synergistic problem with them and possibly the steering box? Or is everything pointing to the box and this is not symptomatic of bad ball joints?

 

... sure hate chasing my tail!

Edited April 18, 2019 by hex0rz

[Dieselfuture]

1 hour ago, hex0rz said:

Upon rounding a curve, if I go a little fast, enough to feel it in the seat of my pants, so to speak, it feels like all the sudden I hit ice. It's a warm sunny day, no ice. But all of the sudden it's like I lose some steering as if I hit ice. I end up correcting about 1/8th to 1/4 turn to stay on course. Scares the crap out of me. I do not get this condition if I'm going slow. I haven't tested low speed sharp turns either. 

How does a track bar look, sometimes it can be tricky to check if it's loose. That's what holds axle and frame in check with each other. Also take a look at your control arms.

1 hour ago, hex0rz said:

do get road wander. Steering wheel has about 1/8th turn slop. I have replaced the front steering components with moog.

Hate to say but moge is junk nowadays. 

 

1 hour ago, hex0rz said:

Upon braking, the truck will want to pull one direction or the other. Enough that sometimes when I let off the brake, I've overcorrected too much.

Scenario 1

One of the calipers is grabbing harder than the other, rebuild them for ten bucks a piece if you can, or buy new ones.

It could be as simple as sticky sliders, that calipers are mounted with. Don't use antisize on them, use hight temp synthetic brake grease. 

Scenario 2

Since it goes side to side, that's telling me something is loose causing alignment toe-in out to get out of wack. This could be related to your ice feeling. 

 

How do your wheel bearing hubs look like, be easier if you had tires on to wiggle them

1 hour ago, hex0rz said:

Upon these findings, I have considered that it was my ball joints. They're still OEM and ive never been able to get grease to them. The zeros were seized up and the ball joints hardened with old grease. As we speak, the truck sits in the driveway in process of ball joint replacements with new moogs

I was under the impression that stuck ball joints were Spicer non greasable. Grease zerks can be changed, they simply unscrew. Although I have seen a press in kind, either way if you get them you can find one that is self threading. Sounds like you're changing them anyway. 

 

1 hour ago, hex0rz said:

Something that I did note is that at the pitman arm shaft on the steering box. It looks like it may be leaking. It also looked like the shaft in the steering box had some slop in it. Would there be a way to fix this or do I have to replace the box?

Sting box can be tightened using over Center adjustment. There is an allen head bolt and a jam nut on top, loosen the nut turn the bolt clockwise quarter turn, while you're holding it tighten the gam nut back. See if it helps, you can only go so far tightening that screw down, so go in small increments. If the box is licking you might be better off just buying a new one, blue top is what II'd go with.

 

Good luck 

[hex0rz]

I'll check the control arms and track bar. Track bar got replaced a couple years ago. Unfortunately, I'm one of those guys in a rock and hard space. Would love to spend big money bombing my truck. But that adulting part doesn't allow me... so I have to go with my best judgement and meet somewhere in the middle. 

 

Wheel bearings and hubs are good. Replaced bearings a few years ago or less.

 

Replacing ball joints for a few reasons. One, to know it's been finally done. Two rule it out as a symptom, three, approx 265k miles of wear and tear on them. They show it. 

 

What is this over center adjustment? I'd the only result just a tightening of the internals? Never heard of this. What's blue top?

 

I'll try and get a quick video of the box if I can.

[dripley]

Blue top is a vendor here and rebuilds steering boxes. He builds a very good box from all I have read.

 

If you look on top of the steering box you will see the adjustment screw that @Dieselfuture speaks of. It will adjust play out of the sreering. I have adjusted mine several times thru its life. But at 465k on the box it finally has reached its limits and cannot be adjusted any more. If yours has ot been adjusted before you could go half a turn and see what that does. Only takes a few minutes to do. Open the hood and look down at the box and you should see it, if it is not to dirty. If you tighten it to much you will know. The steering will not return on its own if it is too tight.

 

And by tighten, you are not trying to tighten the adjuster against any thing. If you do that you have gone to far. Try the 1/2 turn and see how it acts first. Might need a little more.

 

All these front end parts work together to give you good steering. If yours is all oe chances are it is all nearing the end of its life. I rebuilt the whole front end when I did mine. Probably replaced some things that were not quite worn out. But I just wanted to start fresh with everything.

Edited April 18, 2019 by dripley

[hex0rz]

Finally got the ball joints done. Bought a harbor freight press kit. I essentially broke it with the first joint. It was still somewhat functional, but had to macgyver it greatly to get it to keep working. First side took me forever to do. Learning curve was steep. My spindles are similar to the early 2nd gens. Then getting the right configuration with limited parts, etc. What a fiasco... sometimes I wonder why I still do this stuff. 

 

Second side took me virtually no time st all to get done. Hate the old style hub and axle setup...

 

Anyways, old ball joints were definitely worn out. Im gonna have to do this as s process of elimination. I'll drive the truck and see how the ball joints affected the truck and then go from there. 

[hex0rz]

Drove the truck some more. Not satisfied with the way it handles. Felt like the steering was even looser.

 

Going down the road, it wants to wander and follow any groove in the road and takes quite a bit of input in the steering wheel to correct it.

 

I can saw the wheel back and forth down the road and feel when the tires respond. The steering wheel has about an 1/8th of turn of play for this. Beyond this, when driving, it comes out to the equivalent of turning the wheel by 1/4 when it wants to wander and follow something.

 

Im going to try the steering box center adjustment as ive never done that before and the symptoms listed in the TSB seem to align with what I have.

 

Im thinking about taking the truck in for an alignment to see if i need to get something put back into spec. Ive still gotta check the trailing arms and bushings to make sure they're good. 

 

Been reading up on the caster adjustment and curious to see what the alignment shop says it's at.

[Dieselfuture]

On 4/27/2019 at 3:27 PM, hex0rz said:

Going down the road, it wants to wander and follow any groove in the road and takes quite a bit of input in the steering wheel to correct it.

Sounds like too much toe out, you want 0 or .o5 toe in none out.

[hex0rz]

So I had an interesting development occur recently. In the TSB outlined for the center steer adjustment, another TSB was mentioned. In the following TSB it was an exhaustive process to cover aspects of steering issues. 27 pages worth actually!

 

While I brushed off several of the things listed, I will still consider them if necessary. But one of the things, which was toward the end of the article, caught my attention.

 

Once I read it through, I had a very vivid flashback of something I did several years ago. On the front passenger side, there was a 3.5mm shim on the hub. I never thought about it much and thought maybe somebody put it there for something relating to the wheel.

 

Lo and behold, I found the shim as I never threw it out. I stuck the shim back on and took it for a drive. Maybe im experiencing a placebo effect, but on that drive, it was amazing. Night and day!

 

Im still not going to hold my breath, but hopefully it's a step in the right direction. Im still going to adjust the center steer and see what that does...

[Dieselfuture]

I'm lost, where does this shimberg go and what does it look like,  any pictures or links.

[dripley]

9 hours ago, Dieselfuture said:

I'm lost, where does this shimberg go and what does it look like,  any pictures or links.

me too. did it shim the hub bearing? i never saw any TSB's on the steering. of course I never looked for any. you want to share where you got them?

Edited April 30, 2019 by JAG1

[hex0rz]

http://dodgeram.info/tsb/1997/05-03-97/05-03-97_p27.htm

 

It was onn the truck when I got it. So I have no idea. I tried to Google it but didn't come up with anything.

 

Take the wheel off, goes on the hub face where the wheel mounts to.

 

I dunno who carried them in order to facilitate this. I'll try and dig more. 

[Dieselfuture]

5 hours ago, hex0rz said:

Take the wheel off, goes on the hub face where the wheel mounts to.

I gotcha ya, so it's just a wheel spacer sounds like. Maybe someone was trying to correct for a worn-out track bar, to get the axle and body centered.

[dripley]

It almost reads like the truck came with them but they are swapping them out with thicker ones. Mine never had any unless the tire co threw them away when I bought my first set of tires.

[Dieselfuture]

Maybe it was a cheap way to just a track bar

[hex0rz]

I tried the center steer adjustment yesterday. I tightened it up quite a bit. The Allen, head, that is. But the slop hasn't disappeared. I turned it about a full turn. Didn't want to go much more as I don't know what to expect. 

 

It didn't remove any steering wheel slop. When I move the steering wheel, it starts in the input to the steering box. Does anyone think this should be fixed through the pre load adjustment entailed in the TSB?

 

Im starting to think it's stemming from a bad box? I guess this thread is evolving into more than one issue...

[Mopar1973Man]

What you doing it dropping the gear into the rack. If you go too far into the rack it will bind up. Typically the way I've done it was go all the way to the bottom and then loose back up about 1.5 to 2 turn but you have to help by lifting the output shaft. The adjustment is just allowing the output gear to drop down into the rack.

 

[hex0rz]

So it's just re meshing the teeth into a less worn out spot?

[hex0rz]

I went ahead and ordered new control arms. Didn't do the replacement bushings as I read that they can be a real pita.

 

Going to warranty out my moog steering components also. After these two things, the only thing left will be the steering box.

 

My sway bar end links could use replacement also, but not sure if this really makes a difference in what im experiencing.