Before the car sat for 10 years, i ran it without power steering for a good 20k miles. Now that I've got the car back running again, and power steering reinstalled, I cant stand the sloppiness left in the steering from running it for so long. I can move the steering wheel from 11:00 - 1:00 and the front tires barely move. Is this the rag joint, the rack, or what? Though I'm mechanically proficient and have no issues with teardown,/removal/replace, I have no clue what part of the system is creating the slop. Any suggestion?

 

You will need someone to turn the wheel while you watch under the hood. Mine was a combination of rack and tie rod ends. Both were original.

 

Could be the rag joint. Have someone watch it and wiggle the steering wheel. There's an eliminator kit for it:

https://www.unbalancedengineering.com/GM/

https://www.camaroz28.com/forums/sus...ide%2A-881963/

 

Thanks for the info guys, Ill know more tonight once I get home and can play with it a little.

SS RRR: The Unbalanced Engineering website has some interesting LT1 stuff, particularly the de-coupled torque arm. Thanks for the link.

 

I had the same problem but i just lowered my window and turned my wheel while looking at my ragjoint to verify. I was able to take measurements of the couplings, gave them to my machine shop and he whipped me out a stainless hockey puck.

still dont know why those were in there to begin with. before i did mine i heard people "well youre gonna get more vibrations in your steering wheel if you just delete it" and to this day nothings changed except i no longer need to take up slack while turning.

 

Me neither, but it's the same concept as the "donkey dong" silencer on the bellows. There was no difference between the two when I put on the 1LE. It's GM just covering their *** in case they come across any OCD buyers who can barely make it out of their house without their senses or feelings being assaulted.

 

i like the "well its on there for a reason, engineers would know why." .....uh-huh.

 

Almost every time something like this comes up, I can trace back to management overruling logic for the sake of money or similar.

I run a modified LS1 setup, gains you a little more clearance around that area.

 

Just wondering if anyone has had any issues long term with using a rag joint eliminator kit when they have long tube headers as well. The heat generation from the headers which is inches away from the joint there is crazy so I'm worried about the metal components of the kit getting too hot etc. I thought about wrapping it with exhaust tape but that just looks dumb so don't want to do it if I don't have too.

 

Nope. Some of my plug wires are extremely close to the primaries as well. If nothing is making contact, it’ll be fine.