How do you...

[SundaySailor]

Well, I've been trying to tighten up the steering on my "50 cub. I was barely able to get a socket on the clamp bolt, and it is loose. I removed the carter pin for the castle nut to tighten that. But, I cannot get any of my wrenches in that tight spot. What is the proper wrench and size for this task? I haven't dropped the front wheels as yet, but I have a feeling I will have to do that just to try the above mentioned steering tightening technique. BTW, the problem with my steering is that I have at least one quarter to one half steering wheel turn before the front wheels will even make an effort to turn. I have reset the toein and adjusted the tie rods. There is no play down there at all. So, it has to be (IMHO) in the steering box itself.


Thanks for the help!

Rick

[ScottyG]

Sunday,

This is a copy of my post from an eariler steering question. Doesn't really address the tool size that you're asking for but it details what I had to do to sure up my loose steering. Worked like a charm. Hope it helps.

Just my two cents on what I had to do.

My steering had the same problem, Allen. Lots of slop (sometimes the wheel would turn 3/4 of the way around before it caught) and very hard steering whenever the shaft bearing was tightened down all the way (the bearing was left loose when I bought the tractor. Here's what I had to do to make everything work right. I hope it doesn't make the more experienced cringe!

Remove the shaft bearing (the metal cover that holds the steering shaft in place next to the serial number). My steering box was full of water so here was my first problem. Rust. Remove the steering shaft and clean the shaft worm real well and inspect for damage. I was lucky enough where I didn't have much wear here. Clean the shaft bearing out real well too to prevent binding in the future.

The original box was filled with a 90W gear oil but many people now just pack the whole thing with lithium grease which was going to be my option because the slop through the years had caused the steering shaft to bump against the bottom of the steering box causing a small hole in the casting.

I fixed the slop by dropping the steering box and removing all of the components. This included the worm wheel, worm wheel shaft and steering arm. Most of the gears where very rusty which probably contributed to the binding problem. The slop was due to some small wear that probably occurs on most tractors. There's a castle nut that hold the steering arm to the worm wheel shaft. Over time, due to wear or the castle nut loosening, that shaft starts to float above the worm wheel. Then, when you turn the steering, the worm wheel rotates but it doesn't catch anything until the worm wheel shaft decides it wants to seat itself. Then whammo. You have steering.

I took a rubber mallet and whacked that worm wheel shaft into place and tightened the castle nut as far as it could go. I then backed it off a bit until I could get my cotter pin in place. I packed the box with grease and viola no steering problems. Boy was I happy.

My slop is now limited to about 1/8 to 1/4 turn which, I think is pretty normal but he steers real well now.

Keep in mind that the steering on these things is ridiculously easy. In fact many car and truck manufacturers of that era used the same setup. The work is in the effort to get front axle out of the casting and dropping the whole assembly. If you're not rusted up too badly, this shouldn't take more than an hour or two.

Hope this helps.