OK guys, this is the problem ive been having for about 2 years now. The steering wheel has alot of slack in it. When your driving it makes it very aggrivating trying to keep it centered without drifting all over the road. Now your prolly wondering if ive done any maintnance in it right? Ive completely rebuilt the front end including....inner&outer tie rods, idler arm, pitman arm, ball joints, and even a new steering box! Still the wheel has about a quarter turn of slack. I dont know what to do now. I took and had it alighned but the guys there didnt know what was wrong, just saying that the steering box was prolly bad. I know its just as bad as my old one because it makes the steering too tight feeling. I think they sold me a bad steering gear. But the slack is still there. Does anyone know what else i can do to fix this problem? Its got to be in the steering linkage. The truck is a 94 Ram. Any info is appriciated.

 

2wd or 4x4?

 

2wd, 1500

 

with your other repairs I would think the steering gear is not adjusted correctly. on the top of the box there is an adjuster. It sets the free play in the gear. I would get a service mannual and go through the adjustment procedure. I have seen reman gears set wrong right out of the box. Just a suggestion.I would think the alignment shop would have known of this and checked into this when they centered the wheel during the alignment.

 

Check out the Dodge Ram Faq's at the top of this page, I outlined some adjustments that may help.

 

Thanks guys for the replys. Ill check out the FAQ page.

 

all i see the the foum faq's link. I dont see one for dodge ram faq.

 

I would try the track bar first, then draglink that is attached to the pitman arm, have someone move steering wheel slowly while your under front end see if joints move and wheels dont, go slow looking at every ball joint and both ends of the trackbar.

After I replaced everything that was worn I adjusted my steering box, got a total of six turns out of it, using a wrench the fits the nut on the top of gearbox and an allen that fits the adjustment screw in the center of the nut loosen the nut but keep allen immobile, loosen nut so you can get a few good turns out of the allen screw, when nut is loose then turn the allen wrench clockwise to tighten the allen head down, snug it then back off a half of turn. then holding the allen immobile, tighten the nut back down, whole trick is to only let one thing move at once. hope this helps

 

It's the 2nd thread pinned at the top of the forum https://dodgeforum.com/m_334375/tm.htm

And Bamory...he has a 2wd....no trackbar for him

My guess would be the steering box isn't adjusted properly. Check out the service manual (available for download in the Merry Christmas thread) as well as any steering TSBs (available at www.dodgeram.org) for proper adjustment.

 

Ya I saw that but I just clip, copy, and pasted the info, guess i should have edited also