Steering shaft welding advice (1 Viewer)

[Cruiserdrew]

So I had a day off and decided to tackle the final fitment of the powersteering into it's new home. I have everyting in place, the box end clamped down but I need to weld the upper u-joint to the stub of the steering shaft.

The positioning is terrible. Now I know why my last conversion was welded so poorly at this spot. There is essentially no way to get the welding gun into position. I tried from below, no dice, above the booster is in the way. I do not want to rely on the set screw only to keep the shaft in place. The welds also need to be good. Any advice from the pros?

Here are a few pics to clarify:

The last pic shows the 1/2 of space between the shaft and the motor mount that was discussed in another thread.

 

[rusty_tlc]

Do not weld the u-joint to the shaft stub. This is the voice of experience. All welding did was melt down the bearing seals and leave me with a lack of confidence in the result.

Pull the whole steering column. I don't know what year you have but in my 75 this is a 15 minute job.
Drill and tap in two places 90° apart for a 10-32 bolt. I put the whole column in my bench vise and drilled the holes. I used the u-joint as a template for the holes so they would line up.
Then I used some grade 5 socket head screws to secure everything.

 

[Degnol]

Can't you pull the steering wheel and then remove the whole shaft and bench weld it, then reinstall it and hook up the Borgeson joint?
Pay no attention to my as I have never done a Sag PS and know nothing about later columns.
I'll shut up now.

Ed

 

[rusty_tlc]

BTW the stub I had left was even shorter than what you have.

Not that I want to compare shafts.

 

[Cruiserdrew]

Hmmm--I guess I could pull the whole steering coluum.

I was told specifically to weld the upper joint by the dudes that sell the spicer shaft materials.

Ed-thanks. No Borgeson joints here! I had Flaming River joints before that look tiny in comparison to the spicer stuff. This shaft is actually a PTO shaft for some obscure agricultural machinery.

 

[Mark W]

10 minutes to pull the whole column out.


What are you doing to support the bottom end of the shaft? The '40 steering column has no bearing in the botton since the shaft is normally supported by the connectionto the box.


Mark...

 

[Cruiserdrew]

So If I pull the whole shaft, can I weld it and sneak the big u-joint back through the hole? The bottom of the shaft has a pillow block bearing in it.

So Mark-weld or drill?


I was also thinking I could pull the booster and MC, that would give me enough working room and the carb is already off so it wouldn't be too hard.

 

[Mark W]

Doh... I see the pillow block now. Since it was dirty I didn't pay attention to it and assumed it was just the stock setup.

I'm kind of puzzled though. I don't see the mounting "cup" on the firewall that the shaft/column assembly normally bolts into. If this entire setup is unbolted from the firewall than yes the ujoint assembly will fit through with it.


I don't know that I would weld this on. If it will fit through the firewall and you can pull the whole column with it attached, then you can alsoi completely disassemble the column after the yoke is welded on. If the need ever arises.
But bolting it on works fine too. I have one setuo here that uses a "D" cross section of the shaft to lock it in place in the yoke. Just cut the shaft to a "D" profile and drilled a shallow depression for the lock bolt.

Mark...

 

[mtweller]

This is what I did....

I forgot to put the pillow block bearing on b/f I welded the yoke to the steering shaft. So I was forced to disassemble the entire column, pull the shaft out, put the bearing on the shaft, and then put the shaft back into the column from the firewall towards the steering wheel. In other words, it can be done, by pullin the steering wheel off and disassembling the column assembly.

 

[DaveWest5150]

Andy...
Are you going to keep the six, or are you gonna go chevy... Cause if your ever
gonna go to a 350 you'll need to get a longer steering shaft to clear the exhaust.
I can explain if needed.
and go get the bearing that goes there... the brass bushing will wear and leave you with a clunking steering wheel
you can get the bearing at grainger...

 

[mtweller]

I got the bearing from:

http://www.vxb.com/Merchant2/mercha...=bearings&Product_Code=Kit7354&Category_Code=

$9.95 + shipping and you don't have to sand the shaft to 3/4", geasable, but you will have to mod the flange holes to match the bolt pattern of the column.

 

[Bret]

I am pretty sure when I did mine the steering shaft mounts from the engine compartment side into the cab. I thought I tapped the shaft out from inside the cab, so getting it re-installed shouldn't be a problem, but I have slept since then so please don't take it as gospel.

 

[rusty_tlc]

Hmmm--I guess I could pull the whole steering coluum.

I was told specifically to weld the upper joint by the dudes that sell the spicer shaft materials.

Ed-thanks. No Borgeson joints here! I had Flaming River joints before that look tiny in comparison to the spicer stuff. This shaft is actually a PTO shaft for some obscure agricultural machinery.

Looks kind of dicey to get that u-joint through the firewall.
When we tried to TIG weld mine the guy at the fab shop welded from the stub side and through the u-joint, we made the end of the stub flush with the inside of the u-joint and he ran a bead around one side then flopped the u-joint and did the other side.

After all that he recomended I add a bolt.

Having had the original Saginaw Manual steering conversion fail at this point because of a weld failure I agreed.

Just consider if you would want to have this weld fail on 80 heading back to Sac. from the Rubicon. A $0.15 bolt is cheap insurance.

 

[fj40forlife]

tac it in place. and take the WHOLE steering off, By that I mean from the steering wheel in the cab, so slide it all the way out and you have all the room out side the car. and you could just slip it all back in , theres a plate that has 4 bolts dont take does off. only the 3 ones theres like one in the buttom and 1 on easy side

 

[Cruiserdrew]

I have been convinced. I'm going through this rebuild to correct all the problems that I saw in the original build. I'm getting a new bearing for the firewall, and I'm pulling the whole thing out to get some good weld on it. THEN, I wanted an excuse to buy a drill press, so I'm getting a Jet press I saw at the welding shop and I'm going to through bolt it.

 

[coiled40gary]

You are trying to attach to the steering shaft, coming out of the end of the steering column?

Drill a whole through the whole thing and put a bolt throught it. It will never slip, it is removable, and nothing is exposed to heat.

A better idea on that top u-joint, though, is a version that includes a 4" slip joint on one side. The steering box is attached to the frame, and the steering column is attached to the body. The body and frame are seperated from each other by body mounts because they do move differently, expecially if you are doing any twisting on the trail. My old setup did not provide any slip, and the assembly wore itself out and became sloppy. The slip joint in the new column I made shows about 1/4" of slip action there, and after about 10 years is still as solid as the day I put it in. That u-joint in the picture is an off the shelf part with the right size hole on one end for the Toyota steering column, and the other end is a 4" slip for a 1" keyed PTO shaft.

Where the stock steering column comes out of the fire wall, I originally used the brash bushing sold by AA to captivate the end of the column. That bushing wore out in 2 years. I had a new one made from delrin, and it has been in place now for 24 years, with no sign of wear yet.

Hope that helps,
gary

 

[Cruiserdrew]

Gary-thanks. I have that same slip joint just down at the box end. It fit just fine with room to spare. Had I been thinking, I would have done it with the slip joint up.

 

[fj40forlife]

if you going to replace the bearing just get one from kurt, its like 12 bucks or something. same some time from drilling

 

[cruiseroutfit]

We weld the top yoke on all the time, after all you never needed to take it off when there was a flange foreged to the end of the shaft (stock steering), I can't see a real reason you would need to take the yoke off. And even if you did you could always grind the weld.

We do use the "set" screw as a secondary... but we do a full weld around the shaft, I've never had an issue with it... In the olden days we used to actually "machine" a keyway into the stock shaft, and then use a keyway, and the set screw to hold it in place. Can't say I know of an issue their either.

The yoke tacked in place:

 

[ranger]

I weld the yoke on, bolts shear.