Are there any known problems with the steering gear box on a 1986 Z28? I have a bit of play, I can feel a tad of racheting. I've checked the whole column, and it looks to be in the stearing box, cause nothing else is slipping. I can feel it a bit on the road, especially during braking.

I guess I need a new steering gear box? Thanks.

 

Replacing the centerlink, pitman arm, idler arm and tie rods helped my car a LOT...It was cheap and it made the car feel almost new again. It tracked less on uneven roads with cracks, etc... The box might be bad but i doubt it. Goodluck

 

You can also adjust the slack out of the steering gear box if that's the problem.

 

First of all, crawl under it and take a long look at the subframe where the steering box bolts up. It's a weak area in the chassis and it's prone to cracking. If you don't have a "wonderbar" to help prevent this problem, pick one up off a junkyard IROC or from an aftermarket manufacturer. Top-Down Solutions makes a great one. If you do have cracks, then that's what's causing the play and you should get them welded ASAP and then put on a wonderbar to keep it from happening again.

If you have no cracks.....steering boxes rarely go bad that way. Usually they just leak fluid from the pitman shaft seal. Check your tierods, centerlink, and idler arm for play, and jack the front end up and see if the wheel bearings/ball joints have any play in them. I just put wheel bearings, an idler, and a centerlink under my RS and it tightened the steering up a LOT.

 

Thanks alot folks. I guess I gotta look really hard at it. I just don't see where it's coming from yet. All the steering linkage is very tight on the bottom. It's only got 77k on it. I had my wife move the steering wheel, and I checked all points to the steering box and didn't see nothing. The crack thing the last post mentioned worries me now. ugh.