[UKKid35]

Machined steering rack bushing to reduce radial play in the steering rack.
Thanks François!

Please tell us more

I have an old rack that needs to be rebushed, even though all the seals were replaced

[worf]

Machined steering rack bushing to reduce radial play in the steering rack.

Please tell us more

I have an old rack that needs to be rebushed, even though all the seals were replaced

Auxiliary bushings, machined to fit, that limit radial movement of the steering arms.

They have two functions: 1) a ‘patch’ for racks that are not rebuilt with the ZF rebuild kit or have a lot of internal wear and 2) limit radial arm movement even better than a brand-new rack.

The effect is more-direct steering feel at the HMI (steering wheel and hands.)

However, as I understand it, they must be machined, fitted, reworked iteratively to match each end of each rack. You can’t just make a bunch of them and just use them.

[Bertrand Daoust]

What Worf said.

I have quite a lot of play on my front passenger (right) wheel. 9 - 3 o'clock. A bit on the driver's side but really not much.
No problem 12 - 6 o'clock.
When I grab the weel and play with it, I can see the steering arm moving up and down. Maybe 1 mm or so.
That mm makes that tire to move maybe 5 mm! Not good.

All the balljoints and tie rods are good.

The steering rack is not re-installed yet but I have a lot of faith it will really help with the problem.
The rack is not leaking at all so I didn't want to do a full rebuild and change the bad internal nylon sleeve.

My friend who did the job, told me he had to machined and reworked the bushing few times to make it fit perfectly.
The inside of the rack where the bushing goes is not machined.
He also said that he made sure that it was not too tight on the steering arm to make sure the steering would not feel heavier than before. Important detail...

Time will tell, but it should do the job.
And really not expensive...

[UKKid35]

From memory, with the wheels straight and car level, the tie rods are not aligned with the rack bar

I reckon that is a design flaw, and is responsible for the wearing the the rack bar bushes