I have replaced all ball joints, wheel bearings,tie rods, front u-joints, and the steering shock on the front of my 1997 2500 ram. I still have play in my steering wheel. I also have done the steering box adjustment diy on here. It has to be something in the colum itself. You can grab the steering wheel and move it towards to dash a good bit. How can you fix this problem? Is there a bushing under the wheel? Also how do you remove a steering wheel with an air bag?

Thanks for all of your comments and suggestions.

 

Have you replaced you stock steering shaft with the Borgeson? Or your steering box could be going out. The adjustment diy for the steering box I don't think would help out a bad one.

 

If you can pull and push the steering wheel in and out, you need this first, http://rocksolidramtrucksteering.com/ . And as far as the rest of the play goes, you need to check the intermediate shaft at the ujoints and the slip joint.As a matter of fact, remove it if you can! Because it might just be frozen up like mine was.

And since you tried to adjust the steering box as in the DIY,that doesn't do squat if the thrust side of the box is loose where the stub shaft is. Download the FSM and you'll see what I mean. I went through a lot of BS only to find out I could have adjusted that part of it.


The nightmare I went through a few weeks ago with my steering, I can help you here. As long as you know for sure ALL suspension parts are good. Feel free to PM if you like.

 

this is a question.
on my buddys 86ish 1st gen ram, the steering wheel was flopping around like a dead fish. felt like it was about to come off in your hands. he paid a guy to replace the bearing at the top of the column. it was good at first, then about 6 months later it broke again. so i removed the steering wheel and a plate or two and we found that the repair guy had put the bearing in backwards. so he bought a new bearing/repair kit at the dealer for about $50 and we put it in and it made it all like new again...

so here's the question - does a 2nd gen have a bearing at the top of the column like the 1st gen does ?

 

I think it does have one, but it's not available from even the dealer. They want to sell the whole column.

If your wheel is loose and you think it's the upper bearing, I bet it's not. It's the lower bushing. If you look at the bottom of the column under the brake booster you'll see a spring. that spring keeps tension on the wheel pulling it towards the front, which seats the upper bearing. I too thought the upper bearing was bad until I used the rock solid ram steering fix bushing. And btw, grab the column where the spring is or where the intermediate shaft bolts to it, and I bet it'll wobble up and down.