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MG MGB Technical - Extremely stiff steering!

Just had the GT MOT'd and the guy commented on the very stiff steering. I've had the car for over a year, and yeah the steering is stiff but I'm a big bloke and I just assumed it was because it's and old motor. Now he said it wasn't stiff enough to fail, but almost! He also mentioned he had no idea what the problem was, and it wasn't even picked up on at Beech Hill where I get my motor fettled (top blokes by the way!)

I was thinking of fitting a quick rack anyway soon, but does anyone have any ideas what it may be?!?

cheers

olly
OT Hayter

Could be misalignment between steering column and rack. I just put a quick rack in my C and assumed that, as I was using the same housing and didn't move the column that it would be okay. It wasn't, by a LONG way. Huge difference after lining it up,using sockets and a piece of tube to slide over the two shafts.
Your rack could also not be lubricated anymore...
Is there any play in the steering?
Rufus
Rufus Pool

Have you greased the king pins recently? if not this could be the cause.
IR Tapner

Olly, by all means fit a quick rack but I would have thought a B rack was quick enough for road use (a C is lower geared as standard) and a quick rack will be heavier to turn.

Get an experienced opinion as Bs are very heavy compared with modern cars so your MOT man might just be unfamiliar. Also, get a grease gun filled with molygrease round the king pin nipples (3 each side) and just keep pumping and turning the steering, with the wheels off the ground, till fresh grease comes out.

Rich

I'd go with what Rufus says and check the alignment between the column and pinion shaft. The factory manuals explain how that needs to be set up and there is info in the archives too. I made up a couple of small tools to use to align mine and thats my job for this weekend actually. Making sure everything is greased and there is oil in the rack is a easy first step though.

Simon
Simon Jansen

I agree with the posters above. The MGB steering assembly is a thing of sublime beauty, and properly maintained and aligned it is smooth, light and direct - like Highland Malt.

I am always amazed at how vastly improved my steering feels after an insertion of grease, makes me wish for one of those foot-powered grease guns as on old Packards.
John Z

After greasing the suspension check your wheel alignment as it's the easiest to do although it costs $$$. A misalignment will cause heavy steering.
Mike MaGee

Olly, Rich is right, don't fit the quick rack certainly at the moment until you get to the bottom of this. The steering is heavy anyway by modern standards but only at parking speeds. Jack the car up and grease the three nipples on each side moving it from side to side and greasing again. You should be able to move the rack from lock to lock by grasping one of the front wheels but don't thump it against the stops.

If it is still tight split one of the track rod ends and try again moving the disconnected hub fully either way. It should move with little or no resistance.

I suspect that one or both the swivel pins are partially seized. If this is not too bad then you might save the day by copious greasing otherwise you will have to strip and repair. This is a common problem on the B.
Iain MacKintosh

I'm suffering from the same problem since fitting a new rack. Rack has been lubricated and the pinion alignment adjusted/ shimmed, stub axles turn freely on the king pins so the tightness must be down to the tolerance between the actual rack and pinion.The current racks are not adjustable and loosen up with use or so i'm told. It is marginally better since the aforementioned attention but still far to tight, doesn't even self centre properly. I am not the only one with this problem, some have been so tight as to be dangerous.

Any suggestions?

Kevin Jackson

K.R Jackson

Kevin, I fitted (and carefully aligned) one of the new Argentine racks, along with new track rod ends, steering UJ and column bushes at the end of last year.

I too lost all self-centreing and it felt dead. Pulled the rack gaiters and found it well filled with red grease so left it in and will probably add some oil in a year or 2.

Anyway, after 1000 miles it's freeing up nicely and is self centreing again so stick with it.

I had the same exp many years ago after fitting new king pins to my C, they felt much worse than the old ones, but they too freed off after a while.



Rich

The Argentine rack is quicker than the standard rack.

Make sure you have the toe in set correctly. The zero degrees all the alignment shops are touting these days makes mine wander a bit and self-centering is affected as well.
Richard Smith

<< The Argentine rack is quicker than the standard rack. >>

The one I fitted isn't, exactly the same 2.9 turns lock to lock (chrome bumper model). Later cars were 3.5 turns, presumably for the smaller steering wheel, I wonder if the 2 racks are interchangeable otherwise?

<< Make sure you have the toe in set correctly. The zero degrees all the alignment shops are touting these days makes mine wander a bit and self-centering is affected as well. >>

Toe-in should be 1/16" - 3/32" at the rim outer edge. Figures around zero and toe-out are for fwd cars which pull their wheels together under drive.

Rich

You could always add a shim in the steering box, 2 thou would make all the difference
S Best

I had a rubber bumper 75mgb .The motor mount on the drivers side was worn out enough that the motor was actually resting on the steering column .It was hard to tell at first what the problem was , it wasn't until I stripped the car that I found it . Talk about stiff steering .

Derek
Derek

Some interesting points here, If Argentinian racks for rubber bumper cars are the same gearing as the chrome bumper racks that would partly explain the weight in the steering, will check how may turns lock to lock and report back. The rack is certainly suffering from excessive internal friction even filled with the correct oil. Im not sure if you can fit shims to these Argentinian racks, please let me know if it is possible. I also had the same problem with the drivers side engine mount, it had collapsed after 300 miles of running-in use, so have had these replaced at the same time as fitting shims to increase the clearance between the column and right rear exhaust. I also have an engine steady bar to fit to hopefully reduce the stress on the actual engine rubber mountings.

Kevin Jackson
K.R Jackson

If you remove the two outer tie rod ends from the steering arms, you should be able to spin the wheel and tell if the problem is in the rack/column or suspension. Its easier to fix the problem after you locate the source than just try to fix everything, whether it needs it or not.
Jeff Schlemmer

No it's definitely the new rack, I had the alignment and tracking done when the garage fitted the new engine mountings and the guy who did it was part of the original Costello V8 conversion garage at Farnborough Kent, so hopefully he should know what he's doing.

Kevin
K.R Jackson

Fitment applications are "all chrome bumper" (2.9)or "all rubber bumper" (3.5) so check the turns lock to lock.

I found column alignment cones essential for fitting this new rack, and yes I have done this job before without them.

If you didn't fit it yourself, I'd get column alignment checked as the lugs on my rack were out of perpendicular to the column axis and needed filing to adjust the angle before final shimming. I told MGOC technical about this and they checked others in stock and said they were all the same.

Rich

Rich,

Thanks for your comments, could you please clarify the part where you say the "rack lugs were out of perpendicular to the column axis" so that I can re-check mine

Thanks

Kevin.
K.R Jackson

Tyres & tyre pressure also come into the formula. When I first bought my car, a 78 GT, it came with near new Michelin ZX tyres. The steering was heavy, but since I hadn't driven an MGB before, I just accepted it. Then I bought a set of second hand mags with 6" rims & fitted with Goodyear tyres.The difference was incredible. It felt like I'd installed power steering. I now use Hankook tyres 195 x 65 on 6" rims @ 32 psi & they seem OK too. Barrie E
Barrie Egerton

I thought I was the only one who had problems with this steering rack. Put mine in about a year and a half ago and the installation fought me hard. I had to file the mounting lugs to align it and clear the exhaust. They will free up with use, and they are adjustable. The screw on top is the adjustment. I will eventually get a real MGB rack. These things are junk.
Emmanuel Kafant

I put one of these in about seven years ago (when Moss was selling them for $99). I simply followed the normal guidelines in the Bentley book about alignment of the steering column. I had to shim the mounts with a few washers on one side but other than that it wasn't too difficult.

I noticed that my rack came filled with grease rather than oil. I wondered if this might be a problem but elected to leave the grease in it because it would have to be totally disassembled in order to switch over to oil. It's been that way for seven years and I have had absolutely no problems with it.

When you mount it, it is essential that the column is in correct alignment. If not, there will be excessive wear over time in the bush where the column shaft enters the rack.

Regarding oil vs. grease, I firmly believe that oil is a poor choice for lubrication in something like a non servo-assist steering rack. This device is a slow moving, high load application and grease serves the lubrication process better than oil - we don't use oil in the king pins do we?
Richard Smith

A few years back I bought a set of dampers and a rubber bumper steering rack at an antique show. I disassembled the rack and noted it was packed with grease, I don't know if it was from Argentina. The rack wasn't worn and there was lots of grease inside the rack housing but the right boot and bushing were dry, the bushing was badly worn and clunked (RHD USA rack). I have disassembled 3-4 racks that were filled with oil and the right bushings in all were in good condition. If you have a rack packed with grease it may be a good idea to inspect the right boot and bushing area for grease. If dry I would turn the steering to the right limit and pack grease in the rack and turn it lock to lock a few times to move some grease into the bushing.

If you have an older steering rack that needs rebuilding try Atlantic Enterprises. I don't know if they do non power racks and they don't list MGB in their catalog. They don't list Jensen Interceptor but several years ago I had them rebuild my son's Interceptor rack and it came back like new with a lifetime warranty. I Have no finacial interest in Atlantic Enterprises.

Clifton
Clifton Gordon

Hi Kevin and Emmanuel, I found the new rack didn't align (meet the column at the UJ) when first fitted so checked it against the old one. It looked fine but when I put a steel straight edge across the bolt lug faces (which bolt to the crossmember), then looked at it in relation to the steering shaft of the rack, I saw they were not at 90°.

Doing the same on the original showed the lugs and column were exactly 90°. Studying further it seems the casting has been beefed up around the bolt holes and plenty of adjustment allowed for in the holes. Unfortunately the casting is not then machined relative to the lug face to make the lugs and column perpendicular to each other.

The lugs are also about 2mm thicker (something in the order of 39mm relative to 37mm of the old rack) and it was approx this 2mm that I needed to file off one edge, tapering the filing to none off the other bolt hole edge, (on both lugs) to bring it into line. Result was a rack that then fitted with the original shimming. On another car it may have been possible to just pack with more shims but on mine the increased height from doing this then caused the steering shaft to rub under the engine mount.

What may have happened to your racks is the popular way of fitting these. That is, to assemble everything together with column, UJ, original shims and rack all loose, then tighten the rack, UJ and finally the column in that order. If there's enough adjustment in the column it will all end up fairly in line. Unfortunately my Argentine rack was a good 1/2" past the max adjustment at the UJ so ended up very badly aligned.

I phoned MGOC technical and they understood what I was on about and checked their stock. They called back and said 3 others in stock were all the same so I could fit it or refund but they didn't have a "square" one. They seemed happy enough that items like this may need some amount of checking and fitting between different cars and that they would not always be a bolt-on fit first time and I agree. Perhaps they need to stress the alignment check/fitting a little more as it is a good item otherwise and I see Richard Smith has his working well also though his may have been different casting/machining, whatever, it's the alignment that's important.

Rich

Rich,

Thanks for clarifying re the relative angle of the face of the lugs to the pinion shaft. Mines obviosly on the car at the moment so I think I will just loosen off the bolts and check the gap between lugs and mountings to see if it is still out of alignment and putting stress onto the pinion shaft.

Out of interest I drove my friends 72 roadster V8 conversion and his steering is about half the weight of mine with good self centering and feel. I am going to check but I think his car has UJ's at both ends of the pinion shaft and therefore avoids the alignment problem altogether and allows for any minor deflection of the rack relative to the frame of the car.I may well have the pinion shaft cut and splined for the additional UJ to cure the problem once and for all, just a matter of finding someone competent to do it.

Kevin
K.R Jackson

Also meant to apologise to O T Hayter for highjacking your thread, but think the imput is relevent to all of us.

Kevin Jackson.
K.R Jackson

Kevin, All, Sorry , I just cast a glance at my old rack in the garage this morning and realised I've explained that angle wrongly. An apology if I've confused you;

The face of the lugs and the steering shaft should be exactly parallel with each other not perpendicular. I was confusing myself thinking of the bolt holes. Everything else stands.

Anyway, I'm sure you got my drift and hope you'll let us know if you get it sorted. Kevin, you shouldn't need to go to the trouble of 2 UJs. If yours is chrome bumper type and you'd like to borrow the alignment cones drop me a mail at rich.email@ntlworld.com Regards, Rich.

Rich

Rich, that is a kind offer and I have made a note for the future. After driving a LHD B for 13 years I hope to convert it to RHD over the coming winter.

In an earlier post on this thread you give the front wheel alignment as 1/16" to 3/32". IIRC the workshop manual gives it in inches also. Modern equipment works in degrees. To save me going back to O level math to establish if I need to use sign, cosign or tangent to work out the degrees, do you know the degrees equivilent?

Thanks

David
David Witham

heh, no worries there Kevin!

I'll have to jack my car up and have a poke around to see what's up. I'll let you lot know.

now all I need is a jack . . . meh!
OT Hayter

Clifton,

You are correct about the outer bushings getting dry. Although I haven't experienced this (though I should probably take a look at mine), this would be a problem with grease vs. oil.

The reason the outer bushes are lubricated when you open an oil filled rack is simply because oil will rund down there and grease will not. Sort of a variation on the 'splash' method of lubrication and may well be why the factory settle on oil. I might even be willing to bet that the original maker of the OEM racks had started with grease - that would explain the grease fitting on the rack rather than a real oil fill. I don't know about the UK, but here in the US, I have never found any garage that happens to have a device that holds oil but has a fitting like a grease gun to use to fill the rack. With my OEM rack I aways had to remove the damper and fill it using an standard pump oil can. And, regardless of the condition of the boots, it was always a greasy mess. At least with grease, mine has remained dry on the outside.

By the way, I have never loosened the boots on mine to inspect the outer bushes. I do know that the damper in mine is nylon rather than steel. Can you tell me if the outer bushes are steel or are there some nylon components as well?

I still believe that grease is still probably the best lubrication method provided a routine inspection of the outer bushes is included in your maintenance efforts.
Richard Snith

Yes, I'm not sure about grease v oil. Many modern components are "sealed" these days and, by and large, they work well. Some components are designed for grease inside, such as track rod ends with nylon cups and we don't have much trouble there. These racks will (should) have been designed as sealed/greased so maybe it's better to stick with it.

I did take the gaiters off mine as the box had been bashed and one was split; MGOC sent another pair so I had a look-see. There is loads of red grease in there, all over the rack and track rod inner ball joints. The only downside seemed to be that this caused an air lock as the rack moves and the gaiters pump up or collapse accordingly but it doesn't seem to be a problem. Whether it could be properly re-lubed without dismantling I don't know but at least the lube won't be lost if the gaiter splits between services.

Regarding the quality. At the price they come out at I imagine they must be coming from a modern automated factory which is already making similar racks. Also I think MGOC, and Moss if it's the same rack, will have checked and monitored quality on such a safety critical item, no one wants problems. I've asked MGOC about items in the past and they can tell you on the phone if they've sold many and if they've had returns.

Rich

OT - If you mean to jack up your car via the front cross member be extremely careful. Be sure to hook the high spots of your jack to "catch" the edge of the cross member to keep it from sliding off (there's no real good way to secure the jack to the flat bottom of the cross member itself.)

Too many people have been surprised - the lucky ones have only lost a radiator.

Me? I'll lift at the cross member, but will always use jackstands. (You may already know this - but I thought I'd chime in, just in case.)
John Z

Back to the stiffness of the steering.

I don't know the names of the components, but I think you'll understand what I'm saying. I've had an oil leak from my rack, from the area of the pinion cap. I replaced a gasket (leak's still there) and opened the upper cover to fill with oil. I noticed a silver gasket and 2 shims. I filled with oil and assembled without the shims. The steering was VERY tight. I inserted a single shim, and that made all the difference. The steering is quite free, now.

Steve Best, is this what you meant in your comment about a 2 thousandths steering box shim? Is the "steering box" the intersection of the column and the rack? In my case, I needed only one shim, and not the two that were fitted.
Fred Doyen

Rich,

Many thanks for the offer of the loan of the cones, hopefully I'll be able to resolve the problem without that being necessary. Glad you clarified re the angle of the lugs, had me going for a while, I was sitting at my desk with a pencil as the shaft and a disposable lighter as the lug and not making much sense of it.

For the sake of further clarity which end of the lugs did you have to file more metal from, towards the front or rear of the car? I was just thinking that if it was the front and I fitted the reduced caster wedges the whole thing might just resolve itself! Just wishful thinking.

Kevin Jackson.

Rubber Bumper GT V8 Conversion.
K.R Jackson

Does anyone know if it is the Argentinian that are metric? I rebuilt mine and it is certainly the later sort with the white plastic plunger in the damper instead of the steel and brass of the earlier ones. I had to fit a new pinion oil seal and found after getting an imperial one that it was actually metric. Also the bolts holding the top cover on are 8mm. My car was converted from LHD to RHD at some point so goodness knows where the rack came from.

Simon
Simon Jansen

I'm probably repeating earlier responses, but I had a '74 with very stiff steering. I popped the tie rod ends out to isolate the problem, found a kingpin that, although taking grease, was galled badly. I disassembled(it was a b@#$%!)it, greased it up good and put it back together, solving the problem.

As for the racks, I bought a new one for my '66 about 6 years ago from the MGOC and found it was filled with grease and it had the WRONG RATIO. Yep, I'm driving around with a '77- '80 ratio rack in my '66. I don't particularly like it, but the thought of returning it and waiting for the two-way transatlantic dance with the MGOC gave me hives.
David

Richard; All that I opened had a metal bush in the right side. The left side is not bushed. The one from a rubber bumper car that was packed with grease probably was not from from Argentina, as I recall it used inch sized fasteners.

Fred; All the pinion cap gaskets I have tried were too thin. If you remove all gaskets and intall the the cap there is a space about of .025" between the cap and the housing. All gaskets I have bought were around .012" thick. Either stack three of the stock gaskets, make your own gasket from thick gasket material or from one of the gasket makers in a tube. The steel shims under the damper cover are used to set the correct lash nbetween the damper and the rack as you found. The procdure is described in the MGB shop manual on page J-6. If you have a Bently manual it should be the same page number.

Clifton
Clifton Gordon

Clifton,

Thanks for the info. My OEM rack also had no column end of the rack.

Alas, I wasn't clear in my last post about "outer bushes". What I meant to ask about were the BALL joints that connect to the tie rods. Are these all steel like OEM or are there some nylon compnents like we now have in tie rod ends?

Thanks
Richard Smith

Richard, All the ball joints I have seen were steel. I haven't looked inside one of the new racks so I'm not sure about them.

Clifton
Clifton Gordon

<< do you know the degrees equivilent? >>

Hi David, Never seen it listed.

The figures in the BMC manual are accompanied by a drawing which shows the measurement position to be on the wheel rim. I took this as 15" and used
SinAngle = 1/32 over 15 for one wheel.

That makes the toe-in angle for 1 wheel to be .12°-.18° = 7.2 - 10.8 minutes.

I used this angle to find the measurements at the tyre for DIY setting which I'll stick in another thread. Regards, Rich.

Rich

Thanks Rich, I knew you would know the answer.

That answer is not far off zero. I know the diagram in the manual you mention. It has always struck me as being impracticle to measure it to the required accuracy on a DIY basis. So I am interested if you have a DIY method that works.
David Witham

David

If you jack up each front wheel and mark (scribe) a line on the tread using a FIXED sharp pointed tool and spinning the tire you can then use a measuring gauge to determine the distance between the two scribed lines at the front and back (fore and aft) positions of the wheels. 1/2 of the difference is the toein/toeout dimension. I use a piece of 1 x 1 wood with a nail in it at one end with the point held against the line on one tire. Use a pencil to mark the position of the line on the other tire, and repeat for the other side (fore or aft).

I have used this procedure for years and have had it checked a couple of times by a tire alignment shop and alignment was spot on each time.

FWIW

Larry
Larry Hallanger

From memory the cups that the balls run in are nylon, and yes it was the shims under the pinion cover that I meant. Just be careful to move the rack through it's full travel as it wears most in the straight ahead and if you set is spot on there it will bind on lock. Also don't slam the wheels against the end stop easily done as well set rack will move very freely with both wheels off the ground.
S Best

Be careful not to set the rack damper too loose as this is one reason for wobble and vibration at the steering wheel. Remember this is a very direct steering set-up and relies on damping.

There is an easy set up procedure in the books, basically the yoke should run with 1/2 to 3 thou clearance from binding (set with feelers). Check also that the damper spring and pad under the yoke are present and correct.

SB mentions wear and sometimes the rack and pinion are just too worn to get working properly (as mine was, clicking and wobbling and a bent pinion shaft). It's great we can get a new rack for not a lot of money. Don't be put off by problems mentioned in this thread, the new one works very well and may just need individual fitting like many parts on old cars.

Rich

This thread was discussed between 23/06/2005 and 30/06/2005

MG MGB Technical index

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