[DeTomaso] Steering rack disasters....

[MikeLDrew at aol.com]

Hi guys,

Lori and I have been busy working on Pantera steering racks this week.   
I've probably rebuilt 125+ by now, and Lori has done a half-dozen or so and is 
very oddly getting really into it!

A fellow ran into some rack troubles and contacted me for help, and I 
suggested that he just ship his rack to us.   I'm glad he did!

His troubles first became known to him when he backed out of his driveway, 
and his passenger tie rod BROKE!   Not the tie rod end--the tie rod itself!  
 Just snapped clean in two!!!!

I'd never heard of that happening before and before he just bought a new 
tie rod, I thought it prudent to get to the source of the problem.

It turns out that a prior owner of his car had rebuilt the rack with a new 
bushing, and that fellow was a SAVAGE.   There simply is no other word for 
it.

But I get ahead of myself.   My first investigation was centered around the 
broken tie rod.   The bit that remained (it broke off almost flush with the 
rack, opposite from the tie rod end) was so stiff that I couldn't move it.  
 I then tried the other end--and it was so stiff I couldn't move it either!

The savage had removed both tie rods during the rebuild process (you only 
need to remove the passenger side), and when he put them back, he failed to 
pay attention to the prior position of the locking ring etc. and he made them 
way, WAY too tight!   The rack was completely bound up solid!   It would 
take enormous force to be able to move these tie rods...and then he drove the 
car like that for who knows how long.

Oh, this genius also failed to lube the rack properly.   Rather than using 
90-weight gear oil, as they originally used, or 0-weight grease, as the new 
racks currently use (and which the manufacturer recommends highly over 
90-weight oil, which is a desperately antiquated lubricant for this purpose, 
according to them), he used some sort of wheel bearing grease, only traces of 
which remained (it was blue).

So, this guy really did a number on this rack.   But I was horrified when I 
got the rack apart and took a close look at it!   Here's a comparison 
between the rack in question (on the top) and another high-mileage used rack 
which I describe below:

http://www.poca.com/index.php/gallery/?g2_itemId=36277

And here's a close-up:

http://www.poca.com/index.php/gallery/?g2_itemId=36281

Simply put, this rack is TOTALLY WRECKED.   There's simply no reasonable 
way to repair the damage that this idiot caused due to complete mechanical 
foolishness.

I felt terrible for the fellow who sent me the rack, as he had bought the 
car and knew nothing of any of this work that had gone before.   I had to 
send him the photos and ask what he wanted to do.  We had a second rack that we 
were rebuilding for somebody else, at the same time, which would then 
potentially be available for sale, but that one was slightly bent on one end 
because the car it came from had been in a front-end wreck.   

I also had purchased one of the brand new factory racks from Roland a few 
years ago, which it turns out I never needed to use, so I had that available 
for sale.   Those things are enormously expensive now:

http://www.panterapartsusa.com/cgi-bin/detail.cgi?prod_id=03031A

But fortunately they were quite a bit less when I bought mine.   He elected 
to just buy the new one, and I sold it to him for the same amount that I 
had paid for it.

That still left the other one.   This one had also been rebuilt by an 
unknown former owner, but the person who did it (who also had some savage 
tendancies) used one of the larger-style bushings, which is designed to augment, 
rather than replace the stock bushing.   I have found this style of bushing to 
be rather problematic, as they often seem to be a bit undersize on the 
inside diameter, leading to binding.   Amazingly, the guy who installed this 
bushing first removed the old one that it is supposed to butt up against, and 
just stuck the new one into the rack freely.   Oh, he did drill and tap a 
hole for the set screw, but he drilled the hole in the wrong place so the set 
screw was nowhere near the new bushings--and he didn't screw it in far enough 
to touch it even if it was near the new bushing!   So all the set screw was 
doing was plugging the hole he had drilled???

The original set screw was still in place, but since the old bushing had 
been removed and the new bushing was too large to fit where the old one had 
gone, it wasn't touching anything either.

We took the whole thing apart (the tie rods had not been properly 
re-attached to the rack and they almost spun off in my hands with no tools needed to 
remove them--YIKES!) and fortunately, for no good reason, I have about a 
half-dozen stock, worn-out rack bushings to choose from.   Oddly, the set-screw 
hole is in a different place in each one of them, so it took some doing but 
fortunately we found one whose hole lined up perfectly with the stock set 
screw in the rack housing.   So we installed that worn-out bushing just to 
serve as a shoulder for the aftermarket bushing to rest against as it's 
intended, then re-installed the aftermarket bushing, taking great pains to drill a 
proper set screw hole and secure it properly.   The bushing was a bit tight 
against the rack and it didn't move smoothly enough for my tastes, so we 
then used a brake hone to slightly enlarge the bushing, and also used 
extremely fine sandpaper and emery cloth to clean up the rack and ensure that they 
played nicely together.

Since I knew the car had been in a front-end wreck I was very careful to 
check the rack itself.   Initially it seemed okay, but upon closer inspection 
I could see that it had a slight banana-thing happening in the last six 
inches on the driver's side.

Not trusting myself to that degree, I took it to my local machine shop to 
have them straighten it.   It was only very slightly bent on the driver-side 
(teeth) end, and it took less than one minute for the machinist to make it 
absolutely perfectly straight again.   Fortunately the material isn't 
especially brittle, and instead is a bit soft and pliable.

So, with that sorted out, we got that rack put back together this 
afternoon, and now it's perfect.   It took substantially more work than they normally 
do, but on the other hand, it saved him $40 because we were able to re-use 
the aftermarket bushing that had already been installed.   This weekend we 
will deliver it to the owner for him to install it in his car, and then he'll 
pull the one that's in his car out and we'll rebuild THAT one for him, and 
that one will then be available for purchase.

Oh, and another guy is bringing his car to our house Saturday for yet 
another rack rebuild session. :>)

Anyway, my ultimate point is to exercise due care if you choose to rebuild 
your own steering rack.   It's a relatively simple job that takes a few 
hours, but requires some special tools if it's to be done in a sensitive manner 
(both of these racks had been savaged with pipe wrenches), and if you fail 
to use the proper lubricant (either 90-weight oil or 0-weight grease), 
over-tighten or under-tighten various bits and pieces, you can create more harm 
than good.

My standing offer still stands--if anybody wants their steering rack 
rebuilt for free, you can always send it to us.   It might take a week or two for 
us to get to it, but when you get it back it'll be gooder than new, and all 
I ask is that you pay for the new bushing ($40) and the return shipping.   
The vendors will do the same job for $375 or so.   

I think we represent a better deal. :>)

Cheers!

Mike