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MG MGA - Steering rack N/S clonk

Just been to have my annual MOT safety test and the tester identified a small clonk on the nearside of the steering rack. Its definitely in the rack and we assumed it was the ball joint in the end of the rack. I have read how hard these can be the get apart and take a shim out.
The car passed the test and the tester wasn't too concerned. He did suggest rotating the track rod through 180 degrees to see if got better.
My question is, does anyone have experience of a joint getting much worse if left and should I go to the trouble now of trying to fix it.
Also does anyone know of someone in the UK who specialise in restoring racks?

Steve Gyles, I think you had this problem back in 2010. What did you do?
John
John Francis

John,
I had a similar problem a couple of years ago which I similarly assumed was due to wear in the steering racks gearing.
The clonk was accompanied with a odd vagueness in the steering where from full lock (on either side) there was a about an inch of free-play at the steering wheel before there was any steering response.

I couldnt find anything wrong at first but when I asked the MGA expert James Horner to look at it he immediately spotted that the rack mounting bolts had all worked loose!

This meant that the actual rack moved about a half inch every time I turned the wheel.

As soon as we tightened up the setscrews the "clonk" and the lost-motion vanished

Your own particular "clonk" may not be caused by this but it is certainly worth a look.

Cheers
Colyn
Colyn Firth

Not me John. My rack has never caused issues. It was a one off hybrid, engineered for me by a 'T' Series specialist engineer. He cut some parts out of my LHD rack and made me up a RHD rack.

Steve
Steve Gyles

Steve this I think was your thread:

http://www2.mg-cars.org.uk/cgi-bin/or17?runprog=mgbbs&access=&mode=archiveth&subject=6&subjectar=6&thread=2010050419273629747

Posted 04 May 2010 at 19:27:36 UK time
Title Steering Play.


John Francis

Good lord. I Don't remember that. I certainly never did any remedial work and it has never been mentioned at subsequent MOTs.

Steve
Steve Gyles

So Steve,
not only is your MGA a "Cool-Runner" but it also appears to have developed "Self-Healing properties too! :-)

I would still check those rack mounting bolts John.

Cheers
Colyn
Colyn Firth

Colyn

John has me worried now. It was the month I sold my house in Lancashire and moved south to Crookham village in Hampshire. A lot on my mind at the time and I honestly do not remember that thread. The car has been inspected yearly since then and not a word said by the examiner; quite apart from my own delving underneath. Never had a hint of a steering issue but I guess I will take it to the Village Motors and get my friendly mechanic to check it out.

As far as self healing I guess it is my Son-in-Law's friendly ghost looking after things. Look up Nan Clarke on the web. It is the ghost from their house in Mill Hill that is a bit lost for space at the moment while their house is being rebuilt. It seems recently to have moved in here. Before then it went with them to their other house in Tuscany Italy for a year. One day my daughter was sitting on the verandah when her Boxter fired into life on the driveway. She rushed into the house to get the keys but before she had a chance to press the unlock button the engine switched off. Porsche said it could not possibly have happened - but it did. Back here keys go missing, never to be found. Oh yes, when their house (couple of hundred years old or so) was being demolished they found a windowless, doorless room in the ground floor area - carpeted with modern day carpet.

May the force be with you.

Steve
Steve Gyles

It must be a good feeling to have a friendly "ghost in the machine" Steve.

Thinking about how my car treats me Steve, and the way each job I do on it seems to involve some sort of minor blood loss, I think that my MGA must have a vampire in it! :-)

Dont worry about forgetting the thread Steve, I often get emails asking me about some of the articles I have written and posts on this forum a few years ago and I think, "Did I write that?"

Cheers
Colyn


Colyn Firth

Steve I was surprised not to see some follow up response to the thread as you are usually very comprehensive. Not surprising that you forgot about if you were moving. Do you have a contact for your specialist engineer in case I need to send my rack for some extra TLC if I can't fix it. No one else seems to have any suggestions for someone to service the rack.


John Francis

John

He was well into his 70s back in 1997 and not in good health. I expect he has passed away by now. He lived in the Marlow area. Sorry, I can't even remember his name. I got to hear about him through the Octagon club and he did the unleaded conversion on my MGTC EXPAG engine in about 1993.

Steve
Steve Gyles

Just had my annual registration check, was picked up for play in the tie rods.

So had to pull apart the acorn nut to re-shim the fitting. Wasn't as hard as I was reading, had access to a tool friends tool for this purpose. A few hours, a little juggling of shims and a nice firm tie rod.

Easily passed inspection, and I now can forget about this for a number of years.
S P Rossetto

John, a new steering rack is available from Moss at around £280 (probably +Vat) just now and this is probably half what an original used rack would cost you.

At todays labour rates it would probably cost you much more to have a expert machinist make you new parts for your existing rack.
Even if a mechanic could remove and re-adjust your present rack, the labour charge could easily be £200 or more.

I would fit a new rack and keep the original with the aim of maybe fixing it up in the future.

I have heard that the new racks are a little stiff in operation at first but do ease up the more they are used.

Cheers
Colyn

PS You haven't mentioned yet if you have checked the racks mounting bolts.

I almost bought a new rack until I found that the clonks were caused by them being loose. Once tightened, everything was fine again.
Colyn Firth

Hi Colin

Yes I have just seen those racks at Moss. I haven't had time to check the mounting bolts yet but will do in the morning.

The previous post gives some hope of fixing it myself but I won't do it for a while as its not significant. Maybe a winter job. John
John Francis

I had same issue of loose rack as Colyn. A very easy zero cost fix so do check before anything else.
In my case nuts hadn’t moved but I think what had made irack loose was that paint I had applied in rebuild had reduced allowing slight movement then slight movement removed rest of paint making rack loose.
Perhaps I was too keen in painting components in rebuild decades earlier, but no further problems.

Paul
Paul Dean

I found that the very slight play in my steering was from a rack ball joint. I took the rack out with some difficulty. Trying to get the steering shaft with the pinion out was awkward. The shaft stuck in the housing and then the pinion fouled the anti roll bar. I found that the shaft moved more easily if the rack housing was firmly bolted down but then had to loosen the housing to clear the anti roll bar.

I had a tool made to undo the ball joint. Barney has an example on his website page, SR-202, https://mgaguru.com/mgtech/steering/sr202.htm, and I have given him the drawing for the tool I had made, cost £20.

I first tried to undo the joint on the bench with the tool in a vice and using a pair of stilsons (pipe wrench) with an extra 2ft bar leverage. Absolutely no joy even with a lot of heat! I broke several dowel pins and ended up using the shank of drill bits. I either bent or broke all of them.

As a final resort I persuaded the machine shop that made the tool to put the cup of the joint into a 3 jaw chuck on a fairly big lathe. We put the tool with the drill shanks into the screwed end of the joint and end loaded that with the tail stock. The lathe did not have a lock on the chuck so we were only able to stop the chuck rotating with a foot brake and me holding the chuck. We then hit the end of the pronged tool with the dead blow hammer that I use for my wire wheels. After a few taps the joint came undone easily. The pins didn't shear or bend. It was really easy.

So I would really recommend using a lathe to get the joints apart and a tool with the pins in. Drill shanks seem to be tough and cheap. I would not bother trying to do it on the bench. I think in the lathe with the tail stock holding the tool tight against the face of the ball joint, the pins are just subject to shear forces with no sideways bending. In the vice its hard to keep the tool flat against the face of the ball joint.

Now all I have to do is find some good shims and put it together again.
John Francis

Interesting to analyse the costs of all this John. A brand new Made in Argentina rack only costs a little over GBP250. I use them in all my conversions (LHD to RHD), and they are an excellent piece of goods.
Gary Lock

This thread was discussed between 25/08/2018 and 04/03/2019

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