95.5 Tacoma 4x4 DX 2.7 Ext Cab steering rack parts

Another good day . I picked up the nut from Toyota dealer so I'm set for the weekend of course if the weather cooperates (I don't have garage here so if it's raining, I'm resting.



Toyota had a surprise for me too. My seat belts that supposed to arrive in about 6 weeks arrived early, so I picked them up too:



Total cost by today's exchange rate is about 177 dollars each. That is about 20 dollars over Camelbacktoyota price but mostly because exchange rate now is on the run (USD dropped about 10 percent last few months). It's still 15% off the MRSP.

Anyway I'm loaded with parts now all I need is time and weather. BTW I need to build a carport but it has to wait as I need to cut down two old trees, some metal structure and a fence that is on the way.

 

It was raining, so I did seat belt replacement instead https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/what-can-go-wrong-with-my-truck.457350/page-4#post-15406401

 

Today I found why Tim recommended 6 tons jack stands for his 4Runner (and my Tacoma). While getting prepared for the rack guide work I found that 2 ton jack stands I have are only 16 3/4 inches tall when fully extended. 3 ton jacks are the same. The frame in my Tacoma is 16 1/2 inches of the ground when truck stands on its wheels (no lift and 30x9.5R15 BFG KO2). I am not comfortable with stacking up a wood under the jack or frame to increase the lift. I just ordered 6 ton stands which are 25 inches high when fully extended. When Tim recommended 6 ton stands in his videos it is not because of weight capacity but because of the usable height. 2 ton stands might be good under the rear axle (I used them there before) but they are to short for lifting the frame.

BTW, 12 ton stands would be probably to high unless you have oversized tires and lift.

 

Yep - I got the 6 ton jack stands from Harbor Freight (do they have those in Europe or an equivalent?). The only issue is when you're working on a car or even some truck stuff the vehicle has to be jacked up quite a bit to make it to the minimum setting, but I guess that's the preferable problem to be having lol. For lifting my frame to unweight the rear my 6 ton stands couldn't reach the raised part so I had to get it from the cab area, kind of a weird feeling. I leave the jack slightly under the pumpkin just in case though.

 

Glad your doing it right. I wish there were a sticky on the proper way to support a raised vehicle, Including jack stands, wheel chocks, etc. Too many of us ignore basic safety when working on our vehicles. Maybe Tim could make a video.

My cousin was killed under a car just a few years ago when the jack failed. It can happen, don't short change your safety-or your life.

 

When I don't need wheels of the ground I (like for example doing fluid film) prefer using ramps to get more space under the truck. I feel more safer with my steel ramps then extended wobbly stand. Especially when fighting stuck bolt or nut.

When I work on wheels or suspension I try to do it one at the time so three others are still providing some support. But there are cases when you need to get the half or whole car of the ground. Then more safety precocious I take the saver I feel. I don't like to be called "flat face".

 

Sorry to hear about your cousin - that is sad. I'm relatively new to auto mechanic stuff, I try to keep everything really redundant due to my lack of experience so I guess that's why I do things the way I do. I'm super paranoid about some stuff double and triple checking torques on lug nuts and other major things like that.

I get what you're saying about the ramps - my neighbors were getting rid of some recently and I thought about nabbing them. They were a little too rusty for me to want to take them though. Same here with trying to keep the most wheels on the truck as possible. Tire rotations are the thing that usually gets me using my stands the most, but I do always try to have my jack under for redundancy. One of these days I'll probably buy some ramps when I have space to store them.

 

Got lucky, they had these stands in local store so I picked them up today.



Same stuff that is made by China for every market in the world. The good thing is that I got them at reasonable price about 33 dollars (after converting from PLN).

Now I'm planning to do the work at my father's garage that is 13ft by 26 ft. But it will be probably over the weekend. Rain or shine.

 

Because when I moved from Cali to Poland I left all my "dirty work cloths" behind, today I bough myself a one piece jump suit. Absolutely absurd story behind that. I wen to a place where they actually have it in stock so I could buy it. He, He - nope. They can only sell to a company, not a private person. This is stupid VAT law and their company setup. They can sell only to a company who handles VAT. A simple Joe Shmo like me can't buy it. I looked around the other customers, who actually were buying for a VAT company and I asked, would anybody buy this suit and right away sell it to me (with small profit). One guy agreed and I, laughing like an insane person, walked away with my new jump suit. What a circus.

 

I have a second thought about not disconnecting outer tie rods. The turning wheel would have to overcome not only 6 ball joints but the resistance from coils. It might be to much "noise" in measurement. When I lift the truck I will know for sure.

For now just to make my measurements more accurate than 70lb luggage scale I made my own scale that "remembers" the highest force applied.



The scale has 1.5lb max, and I put graduation marks from 0.5lb every 0.25lb. Maybe it looks getho but it actually works OK. Short piece of conduit pipe, spring, wooden dowel and some bolts made the scale.

And one more question about jack stands. 2-ton HF stands are marked just 2-ton capacity. My new 6-ton are marked 6-ton capacity but the instruction says that 6 ton is total capacity of two stands (that is 3 ton per stand?). Does it mean that my HF stands have capacity of 1 ton per stand, 2 ton per pair?

The other note from the jack stand safety is to never use two pairs of jack stands to lift the entire truck. Only one pair can be used and lifting must be done to one side only (I mean front, back ore either side), having always two wheels on the ground. It makes sense, as with small footprint of this type of jack the stability is questionable. Truck on 4 jacks can easy fall down. If all wheels must be of the ground a lift or a different jack stand (with bigger footprint) must be used.

 

Jack stand ratings are likely for the pair. So your assumption regarding the HF stands is probably correct.

 

Thanks for confirming. I did not know that and I always thought the weight is per jack, not pair. Oh man I was so wrong and so lucky to not overload them. I just read about it, which is probably not a common knowledge (I am a living proof about that ). The same applies to ramps. Here is a picture of the label on my ramps.



Now I looked at HF site on their all current jack stands and they actually showing that rating. For example:



The manual actually says exactly what it means:



So I guess we should follow the statement I saw:

 

Let's get back to rack guide. Nice weather, drove to my parents house and worked on my Tacoma. Actually before that I had to fix my parents car, as driving out of the garage my father drove his car over a wooden construction he did not see ripping out the bumper cover and breaking some clips on the way.

So one hour later I drove my truck into garage, chocked rear wheels, removed the steering rack skid plate, lift the front putting a 2ton jack under the front cross beam (where the steering rack is mounted to) and finally put my 6ton (actually 3ton each) jack stands on each side under the frame just behind the front wheels.

I'm set. Te work is straight forward, I did not take any pictures as Tim's video is way better than any pictures I could take. First I tried to measure the resistance on the steering wheel with wheels attached. There is no way I can take any measurements as they varied each time by 300%. I decided to screw all physics and calculations I made and go by the feel. If it worked for Tim, it will work for me.

The first and only difficulty I had was removing 54mm flat nut. I used WD-40 on it but still did not want to budge. I molested it with a pipe wrench but I did not care as I had brand new nut in the box. Finally the nut gave up the fight with a pipe wrench with handle extended by other wrench to about 2ft. The rest was as easy as it was shown on Tim's video.

The 54mm nut had a residue of some kind of glue that Toyota used it at factory (I guess), not a blue loctite, but some kind of white glue. Other thing is that the sway bar is a little in the way especially when applying torque wrench. But I managed to actually torque it exactly as specified.

I followed Tim's video, cleaning the rack from old grease, putting new lithium grease on the rack and guide and gluing the spring with a tap of grease, exactly like on the video. The only difference was in my 19 deg. calculation. I marked two corners of the hex hole in the guide cup, that is 60 deg exactly. Divided by 3 is 20 deg. Accurate enough.

Additional comment to the video, about holding the cap with wrench while tightening the nut. The nut wants to take the cap with it. That's the fact. No "maybe". I did not have a helper (my parents are way over 80 not fit to go under the truck), so I grew extra pair of hands (I guess) and tighten the nut while holding the cap at the same time. And of course, I made the same markings to watch if anything moves later.

So here is a proof of the work, pictures taken after I drove back home (16 miles) and nothing moved.



On the picture below you can see my 60 deg markings on the cap. You can also see how close and in the way the sway bar is.



No, my rack does not leak. I think this is overspray from fluid film or some other crap.

So Tim did not follow on his video if they ever changed the cap position or they left it at 19 deg back from 18 ftlb torque. I felt the steering wheel with still original guide in place, then without a guide (there was a significant difference) and then with the new guide torqued and backed off. It feels the same as before the change. So I guess it is OK. The wheel returns to the center after the turn and there is no sloppy feeling in the steering.

I tested the truck driving on some dirt road (full of pot holes) around my parents house and the annoying knocking is gone. There are noises from skid plates, rear leaf springs, bed moving, some panels rattling but no more steering knocks. I am happy as a clam.

Now here is a little video I put together to show where the knocking sound comes from. This is a design flaw in the guide, I don't know if the slope was from the day one or was developed after few years of driving.



If you don't want to watch this boring video I just say the knocking is from roller free to move side to side ( or up and down when installed on the rack).

And finally I did check my front suspension while I had front wheels up. I did the "crowbar under the wheel" test to check my lower ball joint. Doesn't matter how much force I was using the ball did not want to move even a bit in the socket. All bushings (including steering wheel bushing) are like now no cracks, no slope, no free movement. I guess my truck was made as a "demo truck" because these parts are amazing.

Anyway, I still have a set of OEM ball joints for my Tacoma on the shelf.

BIG Thanks to @Timmah! for putting together such excellent video and for being a source of knowledge and experience.

 

Awesome. Glad the steering rack guide fixed the problem for you. Jordan never mentioned if he changed the cap position later on but I'll ask him and update the video description to let the viewers know. Thanks for the reminder.

 

So 6 weeks later I checked the locking nut markings. Locking nut did not move. All works perfectly.

Now I'm after other noises. Some old city roads are in awful shape. I'm glad I brought off read vehicle here. I know this 22 years old truck will never be as comfortable as my 2012 4Runner but I will try to make it as quiet as possible.

 

I talked with Jordan a few days after the job and he kept the cap position in the same spot. So, the approximate 19 degree back off from
18-ft-lbf was about right.

 

And you guys are back to talking about this on the very afternoon I join the forum with the same problem. Spooky. I had seen part of RysiuM's thread that included Timmah!'s video a few days ago. Good job to both of you. Very helpful, thanks.

RysiuM, you seem to imply the guide bearing didn't need to be replaced purely for function, only to get rid of knocking. That was the impetus for my post (about tolerances) that you answered earlier today; that there may be some movement in the steering rack that is acceptable. I'm still wondering about that.

 

I saw some info that the guide from factory did not have such movement. It is because washers on each side are wearing off. I think the slope might have negative effect on steering in the way how the pinion is engaged. Because the pinion gear is not straight but "twisted" any move up/down will move rack sideways so itwill move wheels a little bit creating a slopy steering feel especially at high speed. It will not affect the alignment just steering itself.

 

Thank you for the confirmation.

 

More good info, thanks, RysiuM.