Steering rack bushings

[JPaul]

I spent time today replacing the steering rack bushings with ones from Siberian Bushing and added the Mayhem Metalworks steering bracket I had picked up off a member on here last year (it was just the bracket, not bushings). I was able to pop the old ones out and press the new ones in without completely removing the rack, which was actually the easy part. Trying to get the top mounting bolt for the bracket threaded into the nut on the crossmember on the other hand took me two hours...

New bushings:

Once I got it started though, the rest went smoothly. I don't think it's completely stopped the popping noises I was getting during turns, but the next thing on the list that needs to be done is picking up the Outfitter Design kit to replace the differential mount bushings. LAst time I had checked they all were still good, but after the Black Sheep run in Moab last month I apparently pushed them over the edge and the center diff bushing is torn quite nicely now and one of the side bushings looks shot as well. So yay, more stuff to fix. Really wish it'd wait at least a couple months in-between stuff, lately it's been coming in a huge wave of repairs needing to be done.


Here's a comparison of the old bushings to the new:

The old bushings are very odd, the wide patches measure ~1.27" but the narrow patches are only ~1.18, about one tenth of an inch in difference which is absolutely huge when you're talking about bushings. The inside diameter of the bushing holes in the rack are ~1.26". The really strange bit is the way the bushings are inserted the wide patches are for up and down/front to back stresses, so it still can move a fair bit side to side.

You can see here in the rack how the bushing was oriented by the wear marks:

And I made a video of the comparison of how the old bushing is setup and comparing it to the new bushing:

[video=youtube;ULZPBPYM7_I]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULZPBPYM7_I[/video]

It does seem to not have as much popping during turns, but we'll see how it does. I think the GM bushing design is very odd, if they wanted to add some shock absorption then they should have just gone with a slightly lower durometer rubber but made it a solid patch all the way around instead of having different sized pads. It's dumb though because most vehicles I think don't even use bushings for the steering rack but just mount it directly to the frame.

 

[lowtrac]

What all did you have to disconnect to get the rack moved enough? I bought some bushings off of ebay but haven't tackled the job yet. Or rather, not the round ones. I got the clamp bushing put in a few weeks ago.

 

[JPaul]

All I did was unbolt the bracket on the passenger side, and unbolt the two bolts holding the driver side to the crossmember (after removing the skid plates of course). Then you can wiggle it around enough to pop the old bushings out, I just started to pull them out with a small prybar between the bottom metal lip of the bushing and the boss and then used channel locks to finish pulling them out, they come out pretty easily.

To make it easiest you'll want to jack up the front so that the front wheels can pivot freely as you need to be able to move the rack side to side a bit to get good angles for removing and installing the bushings. Putting the bushings in isn't terrible either, the top one is easy enough, I just used a large C-clamp and put one of the washers from the bolts on the top (it has a slight recess it can sit in on the steering rack to help keep it in place) and pressed it in that way. Be sure to use the assembly lube, and you'll probably need to use a flat head screwdriver to help push the top lip of the bushing all the way in as you start it in, it's going to want to tilt over as it's pressed in and if you're not careful it could shear off part of the lip of the bushing. Once you get it started though is slides in pretty easily. Apply the lube to both the bushing and the inside of the bushing hole in the rack.

Don't worry if you don't get them completely pressed in, they finish up fine when you tighten down the bolts. Probably just make sure that the upper lip is all the way through, I used a small right angle prick (like the ones used for pulling pins and o-rings out) to hook underneath the lip and make sure it was pulled all the way through by running the prick around between the lip and the steering rack mounting boss.

The side bushing is a little trickier since you can't easily get a clamp in there, but some large channel locks should do the trick, that is what I used.

It's probably a lot easier if you have a second set of hands to help you out, but it can be done with just one person. Really the most trouble I had was getting the first bolt started for the passenger side bracket, I just couldn't get it lined up straight with the hole to save my life, took me two hours of wrestling with it. The rest of it was pretty easy. If you're using the full set of three bushings then it's going to be a pretty simple task.

 

[lowtrac]

Awesome. Thank you. This is on my list of things to get done in the short term. I know what you mean about the top bracket bolt. It was a bit of a chore to get that one back in. My passenger side bushing was totally missing, so just doing that tightened up the steering substantially as you may imagine.

 

[JPaul]

No problem. Yeah the bolt was a lat harder with the Mayhem bracket since there is even less room to get your hand in there and it's even harder to line it all up right. I also had to cut the bolts shorter since they were too long by a quarter inch to fit the bottom bolt between the crossmember and the differential cover. I have no idea how those fit on the previous guy's H3...

 

[Peep]

Was the result noticeable

 

[JPaul]

For me, not really, the old bushings including the passenger side were still just fine. I'm sure it made an improvement, but this was more chasing a possible problem (popping noises, they didn't go away which means it's likely the diff bushings) and preventative maintenance (now I won't have to worry about my rack busting in half on a trail somewhere, though I'm sure it's still possible it can happen , just not near as likely).