2nd gen steering rack slider bushing?

Alright all. I have been dealing with some clunky steering at the mid point for some time and found out after pulling the boot off the driver side that the rack rod itself moves up n down a little bit creating some excess gear lash in the rack and pinion which seems to be my point of sloppiness in the center of the steering.

I know on the first gen racks there is a slider bushing that you can adjust to tighten up the lash, but what about the second gens?

I cant for the life of me find an OEM exploded view of the steering rack that shows the slider as replaceable (if there is one under that cap and cover)

It would seem that the slider bushing is located under here (circled in red) with the same adjustment functionality as the first gens?

 

Back lash in the worm is different from play up and down with the shaft. Tightening that is rarely needed and usually causes overly stiff and steering that doesnt return on its own.

 

WARNING! Do NOT do this, but this is how I did.

There is a spring and slider bushing located underneath the guide you have circled. The slider is just a short cylinder with a c-shaped carving on one end to press down on the rack at the pinion. It is coated with Teflon there. Yes, it can be tightened down a little and was the final piece in solving all my steering slop and clunking. The other piece was the TSB upper intermediate shaft.

Now the fun. I actually made two tools to do this. The first was one to loosen that large jam nut (I have since found a crow foot that works) and the other was a 1/4" socket I modified with a welded on piece of steel to engage those notches on the top of the adjuster. It can be done while in the vehicle with patience and creativity. I worked by removing the left engine cover flap along the frame. The worst piece is breaking loose the jam nut. It seems to have a drop or two of blue loctite on the threads.

Very small movements (seems like it was only 1/32 or 1/64 of a turn) did much in mine. But it is very important to immediately test on a vacant local street and see if the steering binds and easily returns to center.

The good news is the new replacement OEM rack uses a hex key there, like the Lexus and 1st Gen.

 

Whelp before you guys chimed in, i said eff it after looking at some pics. Jam nut loosened pretty easy with a pair of channel locks, pulled everything out and inspected cleaned and regreased, Slider bushing showed slight signs of wear but nothing to be too concerned over.

Put her all back together with ~ 1/4 turn more than what it came out as (as much as hand tight with a 3in piece of steel notched into it would allow). No more audible clunk when the gf was jiggling the wheel back n forth like before. Steering feels less sloppy when driving around the block, steering is tighter but does return to just about center without intervention. I call it a tentative win at this point, i need to get her on a longer drive to verify.

Does anyone have the OEM part number for the 2nd gen steering rack slider bushing? Its 35MM in diameter FYI (if it could be compared to a first gen slider)