Steering Box Rebuild

[idiocrates]

Okay.....its beginning to look like the only way I am going to find the end of things to rebuild on this jeep of mine is when I'm looking at the asphalt under the jeep. The engine is still at the machine shop......the tranfer case has been rebuilt......the transmission is being rebuilt right now.......I've got all the hardware wire wheeled......repainted the air cleaner, oil filter canister, oil filler tube, bell housing, transmission, and transfer case......replaced the clutch bellcrank......replaced the clutch/brake pedal cross shaft......overhauled the brake master cylinder......and am now working on the Ross steering gear. I haven't had this much fun since they sold the horse and bought a tractor! Any way......several lessons learned during the steering box rebuild:
1. reassebly is much easier realized if you clamp your gear box in a vice before starting
2. the lower ball bearings will NOT go into the lower race if you seat the race in the case first because.......
3. you cannot get the bearings into the lower race with the lower snap ring installed and......
4. you can't install the snap ring after the race is seated because there is no way to get there from here.
5. really......you might get 7 or 8 bearings to go in......but 11....furget aboud it!
6. Oh yeah......its an easy assembly to make on the bench......just set the race on the bench wide side up......stand the worm gear shaft in the middle of the race......drop the balls on to the race.....carefully lift the race up to the bottom of the worm gear.......invert the shaft while holding the race in place......and snap on the ring
7. do not cuss when you discover that the lower race will not go through the openning for the upper bearing race. And no.....you didn't get the upper and lower races mixed up......neither one will go through the upper openning.....so don't even think about repeating step 6 with the other race.
8. The epiphany.......with the gear box mounted in the vice at an angle slightly steeper then it is when mounted on the frame.....put the upper end of the shaft into the upper race openning from the inside of the box by going in through the removed side plate. Pull the shaft upwards until the lower race and bearing clears the back of the case....then straighten up the shaft so the lower end is inside the case and lower the seat into its rightful place in the world
9. At this point while drinking may be the first thing that comes to mind my suggestion is to slide the upper race onto the shaft with its wide openning facing down. You can actually do this step later but the long reach is almost always going to make you lose your balls if you try it after they are installed.....so in the interest of keeping your balls intact.....do this first.
10. while holding the upper race up slightly out of the way.....drop the upper balls bearings into the area between the shaft and the gear box case. Oh yeah.....did I mention while holding the race up out of the way kinda keep the shaft centered too. Too much to one side or the other and you'll be faced with that ball dropping problem again.
11. once all the balls are in place in the upper area lower the upper race onto the balls. Careful now......the race won't go all the way down where its supposed to be because its lip is hitting on the too widely dispersed balls.
12. what I did was loosen the vice while holding the shaft and upper race in place and carefully inverted the entire assembly so that the balls could fall into place in the race. then press the race in until there is enough room to install the snap ring......and NOW your thoughts can once again turn to drinking.

This little detail actually turned out to be much more difficult then setting the end play on my transfer case. who'd a thunk it? I might add....this may not work for everybody. My steering box has no horn wire tube in it.....just the pressed in remnant of the horn switch adapter on the bottom of the case. This had a big short bolt screwed into it to keep the oil in. So if you have a tube all I can say is.....good luck!!

Jim

[lilm38]

I actually did a rebuild of the steering box last night. The worm gear bearing kit I got from Midwest has the ball bearings preset in a plastic snap in type assembly. I knocked out the old cup seated in the bottom and then installed the new cup, preset ball unit and snap ring onto the steering rod and carefully slid it into place through the top of the steering box. I then installed the 3 bolts for the triangular mounting flange. You can check to make sure the cup is properly seated before bolting the box on by looking through the removed s box coverplate. Midwest also makes a combo threaded horn switch holder/horn rod guide tube unit which I then pressed into the bottom of the box. After that it was easy to slide the new horn button rod up through the steering tube from the bottom and screw in the horn switch assembly.

[idiocrates]

Well I'm a little concerned. Wonder now if my races are spread or what cause they sure wouldn't go through that top opening. I tried them both ways and with and without the worm shaft...and there was definitely no way they were going through. Oh I guess maybe I could have hammered it through with a brass punch but I was worried about breaking my case or damaging the race so I elected not to use this kind of force.

Probably has as much to do with you having new races and me reusing my old ones as anything.......and that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

My only other concern.....did your's have a seal in the three hole hub at the top opening of the case? Mine didn't.....yet there seems to be one shown in the ORD 9 manual......but not in any of the subsequent parts lists......and goll darn it....I want one. Does anyone have a picture of one......or a modern part number.....or what the old seals were made of?

Jim

[53a1]

I've seen both, with seal and without. The one with the seal was out of a V6. The m38a1 had no seal but a deep flange that you could easity stuff a piece of felt inside. At least on mine, the oil level does not go above the triangle cover and the felt would only serve to keep the oil from running out when on an incline.

Did you replace the sector shaft bushing and seal? That is way more of a concern in my mind because the oil will run out through there in minutes.

[idiocrates]

I only replaced the seal. It seemed to me that the shaft and bushings had very little wear and were "tight" when mated together. My primary concern regarding the top gear box seal was more to seal the guts of the steering gear from dirt and dust then from keeping the oil in. I figure if the oil comes up out of the gear box I'm probably misbehavin anyway and deserve whatever happens. In my neck of the woods dust is the real killer so if worse comes to worse I'll figure out some way to seal the outer tube to the hub before I clamp it. Thanks.

Jim

[skyjeep50]

One way to hold the balls in the races is to coat everything with grease then assemble. Keeps your balls from running away and hiding under the bench.

[53a1]

Your lucky. I think most of these boxes need new sector shaft bushings along with a new sector shaft because the tabs on the sector are flat.

[idiocrates]

Really........this has been one of the bright spots on this jeep. Everything else has been very worn out so I was pleasantly surprised when I took the box apart and got it all cleaned up and found everything looking good. I think maybe the previous owner must have done some maintenance here but he sure didn't admit as much. How long have the ball bearings been supplied in the plastic ring? There was no such ring in either the top or the bottom of my box so it must have been before that anyway. As an example of the kind of wear I usually run into.....take a look at my clutch/brake pedal cross shaft.....



and the end where the brake pedal rides......yikes...



Yeepers.....I'd say i got pretty lucky on the steering box!

Jim