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MG MGB Technical - Raising Steering Wheel

I want to raise the steering wheel a bit (by raising the column, of course) on my '73 MGBGT. Has anyone done this?
Steve Lipofsky

Look under the dash board where the steerin column meets. You may have a bracket/bolt/nut that allows some up and down adjustment.

Got it on my '64.
glg

Steve, There is no adjustment for height on the 73. There are some packing washers under the three column mounting bolts, they are about 1/8" thick, but they are needed for column to rack alignment. If you have the Bentley MGB shop manual look in section Ja. I assume you are looking for leg room. I guess the cars were designed for people with tooth pick size legs. A smaller wheel will help some but the low speed steering efforf will increase. Clifton
Clifton Gordon

FWIW, a fellow club member needed more thigh to wheel room in his '70 and installed, I believe, a Momo wheel that has a flat section on the bottom of the wheel's circumference. It looks to me like a pretty good idea.
David
David

Steve, If you need more space...ever think of lowering the seat? The cusion is fairly thick. shave an inch and you may get the results you desire with out loosing too much comfort.

Then your head won't hit the roof and maybe you can see that trafic light.

Hmm...might try this on mine.

Doug
Doug Gordon

The early cars had wooden packing strips under the seat rails as well.
S Best

'73 B's still had the wooden packing strip under the rails. Mine still has them. They are about 3/8 in. thick (memory here - don't hold me to this).

Don't know if this is enough but more than you would ever get from trying to adjust the steering column. Besides, the steering column in a US spec '73 is the collapsible type and alignment is very important to ensure that it works correctly. I wouldn't mess with that.
Richard Smith 1

I removed the spacing washers and ingress and egress is much easier. I also find that the steering wheel position feels better.

I realize that the car has a collapsible steering column, however, if you consider the mass and height of most cars on the road with you, I do not think that moving the angle of a steering column by a few degrees is going to matter.

Steve Sletta
CCfan@aol.com
Sletta

Steve,
It's not a problem with the wheel collapsing - it's with the steering column aligning with the racks pinion shaft. If the two don't intersect properly, you'll put bending loads on the pinion shaft. This sooner or later results in metal fatigue in the pinion shaft. It can suddenly snap in two! Check out the manuals about using the special tool for alignment, it explains how to do it.

Tom
Tom Sotomayor

Thanks for all the suggestions.

My car is a GT, so I have tons of head room and forward leg room. I'd just like a touch more thigh to wheel room.

I would think that the u-joint on the steering column would allow the spacers to be removed while maintaining alignment. No?


I would think that removing the wooden spacer under the seat rails would inhibit seat adjustment.


Steve
Steve Lipofsky

Steve L,
If the spacers are removed you "may" still line up and maybe not. It depends on where the steering column pivots when the spacers are removed. To illustrate: Make yourself a sketch. On the left, put a dot for the center of the U-joint. Several inches away, put a dot for the fixing point of the steering column at the firewall. Draw a line through those 2 points and extend it several inches further to the right. Mark on the line (to the right of the other two dots) where your spacers are. Now mark a new dot above the line, above the spacers dot. This is where the column goes with the spacers removed. The column is fixed at the firewall, so draw a new line through the new upper column fixing point and through the firewall dot. Continue the line to the left. It no longer goes through the center of the U-joint. You will now put a bending load on the pinion shaft for the steering rack. This is NOT a good thing!

One of our club members just put a new rack in his B several weeks ago. Don't think he was carefull enough in aligning the pinion and the column. It didn't last long before the shaft fatigued and broke in two - rather suddenly! Fortunately for him he was at low speed in a parking lot. No other damage was done, but he was very lucky.

Any changes to the rack and/or steering column warrants realigning the two. Don't trust to luck!

Tom
Tom Sotomayor

Tom,

You've convinced me. Thanks for the good advice. I'll leave the column as is.

Thanks!
Steve Lipofsky

This thread was discussed between 16/06/2004 and 19/06/2004

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