Seems that my Cherokee has some wicked death wobble above 50mph.

I found the drag link to pitman arm ball joint to be blown out. Of course that is to be replaced, but i've also found the steering box to have about 1/8" or so of up/down free play. Is that normal?? It is allowing the pitman arm and drag link to bounce up/down when driving.

Is there a way to tighten the up/down motion and adjust it out? Or, do i simply have a burned out bearing in the box and it needs replacement?

 

Anybody?

 

Do you mean that the whole box has up and down play, or just the shaft coming out of it?
If it's the shaft, I would certainly try to adjust it out before replacing the box.

 

The entire box is well affixed to the chassis and is stationary. The shaft itself has up/down play in it, which is causing death wobble. No side to side motion though.

I know how to adjust the on center slop (when you can turn the wheel a few degrees L/R and nothing happens)

How do i tighten up the up/down shaft position? Is that even possible?

The shaft is actually able to be pushed in/out of the box! Does that mean my box is worn out?

 

If all the side-to-side slack is out, I would say it's shot.

Hopefully someone with more experience with them will chime in....

 

It's trashed. The only adjustment possible to the sector shaft deals with the 0° straight ahead position. Thats how people run into trouble cranking the over center adjustment down and it binds when turning. Different box time.

 

Now that i've replaced the steering box with a rebuilt unit...

How much up/down play is acceptable? I'd assume the shaft is supposed to have absolutely no up/down motion?

The rebuilt unit i put in indeed still has a little bit of up/down play. It has a bit less than the previous unit, but it is still present.