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a little progress...

I'm not much closer to dropping an engine back in my car, but I did manage to get the steering box I got from Lee in my car today. I don't have the steering hooked back up because I had to clean and paint the frame around the steering box while it was out, and also run the center pivot through the parts washer so that the bearings would actually turn with the pin (old grease gets HARD!) Next weekend time to degrease and paint the front crossmember and tie rods and start putting stuff back together. I can already tell that I have a LOT less backlash than I used to, and that's a Good Thing. I did manage to mess up one of the hard lines on the steering box though, d'oh! good thing I have two...

One question though: when I took the old steering box bracket off the frame, there were washers behind two of the bolt holes between the bracket and the frame. Now that I have that part all back together, I can see why, as the column is pointing vaguely to the pass. side of the car. Should I worry, i.e. should I take my car to a frame shop and have it checked after I get it all back together, or is this normal to see? I did leave all the bolts loose until I had everything pretty much in place and made sure that the column seemed to be aligned with the steering box before I tightened anything down.

nate

Reply to
Nate Nagel
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Glad it's working out, N8.

On the alignment, a little bit of spacer is no big deal at all.

Reply to
Lee

As a kid I discovered on our original 56J that the steering colum was canted towards the passenger side, I thought I was nuts, but developed what I called the Studebaker Slump, thats where you as the driver sits close to the door, and extends your legs sideways to the pedals. In the summer is was easy to drive as you could hang out the window. In the winter it was a bit difficult to sit behind the wheel. When I got my 56J I asked Wayne Morris, Tony Carralla's grandson, about the steering wheel position.

That huge Power Steering box sits on the frame on an angle. You can get under the dash and move the colum to the left, but if you go tooo far the wheel will not return and stick while driving. In Tom McCahills road report he mentions that the steering colums on Studebakers (post 53) have this strange cant towards the right. If you look at the frame, the steering box sits on the narrow frame rail area. Draw a straight line from frame rail into cabin, and see where you wind up. There is adjustment on the box, and frame to adjust the line between box and cabin .

Reply to
Bill Glass

Have my doubts that as the cars came down the assembly line back in the day that anyone spent a whole lot of time making sure every part was in perfect alignment.Car steered for 50 years as it was,dont sweat it.Will you be a SB Nate?

Bob40

Reply to
Bob

Cool, that tells me what I need to know... I'll just make it go away and not worry about it any more. I think if you *just* move the column, you can put things into a bind, but if I loosen the box and column together without loosening the clamp at the base of the column, I should be good to go. I guess the only fear is shimming the box so far it hits the manifold, but I'll worry about that when I get to it.

nate

Bill Glass wrote:

Reply to
Nate Nagel

I had to do exactly that (a spacer/washer(s)) when I installed a '62 dash in my T-cab. No big deal.

JT

Lee wrote:

Reply to
Grumpy AuContraire

Looks like it, I thought I wasn't going to be able to make it but as of today I have that thurs. and fri. off work. will probably hitch a ride with JP.

The column is far enough out of alignment that it bothers me; but I am guessing the two washers that I didn't put back in were someone else's fix for the problem. Silly me reading the parts book instead of just putting everything back where it came from :)

nate

Bob wrote:

Reply to
Nate Nagel

Yes, washers and spacers. Sure the dashboard crossmember is centered too? I regard Stude frames as being approximate.

Wouldn't hurt to have it checked at a frame shop though. I found my 64 Cruiser had been hit in the leftfront, bending the frame up in that corner. I took some measurements and added a 1/2' spacer under the left coil spring, and a spacer under the RHS sway bar mount. Now the car sits square to the road.

Course, if you don't want to know the answer,....

Reply to
fstarr

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