The Camaro Club (UK)

I changed my steering box yesterday. I had the steering wheel straight and the flatspot on the rag joint lined up lovely with the column as that's the only way it can go on but when it came to the pitman arm the keyed spline wouldn't line up. my steering wheel was straight and my wheels were dead straight. I hadn't moved them or the steering wheel since taking off the old box. The new box was centered and the pitman arm has 4 wide flat keyed splines every quarter the way around. One was pretty close but I still had to move the steering wheel so the top of it was pointing to 3 O'clock to get the pitman shaft to turn just that little bit to get the pitman arm on. Now the wheel sits at 3 O'clock. I thought I could just move the wheel on the spline but the horn setup does allow that. Doesn't matter anyway because the steering now spins 1/4 more of a turn to lock left than it does right, which makes sense as the wheel is a quarter to the right. So I have more lock one way. This was the only way I could set the pitman as the next keyed spline was over a full turn of the steering wheel away! I am thinking perhaps when acdelco made this reconditioned box they didn't put the pitman shaft on the gear in the right location so it doesn't correspond with the input shaft correctly? Or perhaps those 4 keys on the pitman shaft aren't keys at all but just pointless flat spots and that I could have hooked it up a couple splines over? Sure didn't feel like it though when I was first trying to get the pitman arm on when the steering wheel was straight. Either that or I have actually managed to get the arm crammed on in the wrong position and the keyed wider splines aren't lined up. But that surly isn't possible right? It seemed to pull on rather nicely when I done the nut up.

This is a suprisingly common issue, and one I had myself. You may think you put the rag joint onto the box correctly, but it's 90 degrees out. The flat on the box shaft has to match the flat inside the rag joint - it's not the gap where you tighten it, but if you look closer there is a part of the round section that isn't splined.

Here's a pic showing where I'd got it wrong. It the top of the joint, what looks like splines are grease lines where I'd put it in wrong. There are a couple of gaps showing where there aren't splines.

If only that were the case and it was that simple. The steering wheel isn't exactly 90 degrees. It's between 2 and 3 o clock. The rag joint is definitely right though as I had the steering wheel centred and the box too. The flat spot on the box was on the top and so was the one on the column. The pinch bolt was vertical with the gap pointing to one side. I done this before I did the pitman arm. I am pretty convinced someone put the pitman shaft in a tooth or two over on the gear inside the box so it doesn't correspond properly with the input. Maybe I can get it straight by doing the tracking if it will go that far.