I thought I might make it for 30 days without something needing repair. No such luck. Jacked up the left front tire to check if ball joints were loose. They are not but when in wiggle the tire from the sides, there is about one inch of play. I hoped it was just the tie rod ends but it looks like the movement is at the rubber boot on the steering rack.

Has anyone replaced the rack and pinion on a 1984, and if so, how difficult job is it? Thanks in advance for your help.

Tom B.

 

I replaced mine and i thought it was not that hard. The proper tube wrench would have helped me though
I replaced mine with the Z51 quick ratio rack since it didn't cost any more. I paid $165 CAD for the rebuilt unit. I reset my toe with a tape measure

 

Shouldn't be too much of a problem for you, if you've got a day that you can devote to the job. Also, the car will need an alignment afterwards, or so it's implied when any work is done to the suspension or steering components. If the rack hasn't been touched for years, expect a few things to give you problems namely: there's a hold down clamp that's around the middle of the rack. Obviously, it's the job of this clamp to keep the rack situated. However, it's held down with two bolts which have nuts capping them off. The tricky part is negotiating a backup wrench underneath the shrouded area of the engine craddle where the bolt heads are. It's easy to loosen the nuts, however they'll only unscrew so far until the bolt also starts turning with the nut, getting you nowhere slowly. other than that, to preven damage to the connections/fittings of the lines that go to the rack, it's best to buy a set of line wrenches, this way you won't deform the connections as you might using regular wrenches on them. The rack and pinion is held to the two front suspension knuckes via a castle nut and pinion. Several manuals i've skimmed through suggests replacing these castle nuts at the same time of replacing the rack and pinion. have a suitable place to perform this procedure, as steering fluid will go everywhere if you're not careful upon disconnecting the lines. Now, one thing that can be done is slide the rack out of the engine cradle area after the car is up on jackstands. Just wiggle it a little as you pull on it and it should come out, once all the connections have been freed and bolts removed from hold down clamps, etc;. Slide the new one back in place and reverse the procedures you used to remove the old rack. Afterwards, you'll have to bleed the power steering system and then test out the new rack along with your properly bleeded system in a safe area that is free of other cars. You may want to have a little extra cash handy, as when you begin to dig into this job, you may find little things that need to be replaced. If I missed any points, I'm sure someone else will pick up the slack. Hope that helps some.