Rack and Pinion Rebuild?
 

I thought i saw a nice breakdown with pix of someone tearing down and cleaning their rack and pinion........ I have searched and searched.

I have mine out right now and would like to freshen up everything that is going back in the car

Cleaning a rack and pinion should be possible and easy. I am sure you don't need pictures for that :rolleyes:
Rebuilding the thing is 'not possible' so I heard or that is what VW lets us to believe...

The only part I found for a '79 Vert rack was the rubber boot that covers the outside. I got it from Top Line six years ago. I just cleaned everything good and packed some grease on the rack then put the new boot on.

I agree, i just pulled the boot today, not much there, i'm gonna flush it out and put synthetic in it....... Should be it....


Was just lookin for secret tips an tricks is all........

First time I looked, I didn't see how it came apart either ;)

I pulled my rack apart (2 actually) last week.. It can be stripped down to every last part. I scored new pinion roller bearings, the pinion ball-races were still like new. The rack bushes don't appear to wear at all. I recommend you service your rack while it out and we are here.

When I fitted my 7.5" wheels I simply pinned the rack to have stops that hit the outer ends of the opening of the housing. Rubbing wheels on full lock is a no-no, As is asymmetric steering...

Now I have screw stops to get a minimum turning-circle after I dial in my wheel alignment. I didn't take any pics but I still have 1 fully disassembled rack that I could do a how-to if anyone is interested? The modified rack in the pics may be for sale (RHD). I'll show a pic of the stops tommorrow.

The second hardest part is removing the ring-clip at the end of the housing.

Matt

Pleas a step by step would be great. Plus some pictures of the modified rack with the why and how.

Thanks

Yes please..... I have mine out now and hope to put it back in this week........ It is ready to be disassembled.....

Good call Wally.

Remove the passenger side mounting bracket from the housing by removing the M8 nut and bolt. Next is the second hard part..

Remove the ring-clip from the end of the housing, this may be hard to find and even harder to remove. Be carefull, it will come out.

Remove the plug that is retained by the ring-clip. This may be rusted in. If it is, drill out the centre and tap a M6 or M8 thread. Screw in a bolt and improvise a slide-hammer to pull the plug out. Don't try to push this out with the rack by turning the pinion with grips, the pinion splines are hardened but you need them in good shape!

Behind this plug is one of the foam stops, remove that also.

Remove the plate held on with 2 M8 bolts. Just leave the grub-screw and jamb-nut where they are.

Remove the coil-spring

Remove the little 'tablet' that the grub-screw bears on.

Remove the two half-bearings that hold the rack in mesh with the pinion.

Put one of the inner track-rod end bolts back into it's hole and use it to slide the rack out of the housing.

Remove the large hex headed cap, after 'un'peening the external lock washer.

Without the rack in the way, you can check the pinion shaft bearings for play.

Remove the pinion shaft complete with ball race and it's retaining nut. This nut does not need to be undone unless the bearing is shot, which is unlikely. Drive the pinion shaft out from the spline side. Don't damage it.

That's it! It will be a good idea to renew the pinion roller/needle bearing, one of mine was dry/galled. A bad design as there is no seal. I used an online bearing company: http://www.ondrives.com/products.asp?recnumber=176

bearing OD 24mm
shaft OD/bearing ID 18mm
length 15mm

If your bearing and shaft look good, Ace! If not, find a replacement bearing before drifting the old bearing out.

I could only find 16mm long bearings, look at the shaft and bearing bore, it may take a bearing upto 17mm long, maybe 18mm.

Note, all the steel lost from rack and pinion due to wear and tear is still suspended in that old gease, not good..

I used a molybdenum C.V. joint grease.

Like Mr. Haynes likes to say: "Reassembly is in the reverse order of dismantling" :laugh:

The hard part is reinstalling the ring-clip. Seal it with a smear of copper slip.

The pinion shaft is somewhat self installing, the large hex headed cap will press the ball-race bearing fully home as you screw it in. 're'peen that external lock washer.

When refitting the rack assembly to your car, the last bolt to be tightened is the M8 nut and bolt that goes through the passenger side mounting bracket.

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The modification for adjustable steering limits, to prevent your expensive wide tyres from fouling the innerwings/failing your anual inspection consists of 2 screws with jamb-nuts. One each side, they push the foam buffers deeper into the housing, which will pull the wheel away from the innerwing on full-lock on the same side.

Note, my Beetle is RHD.

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e5...5.jpg~original

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e5...1.jpg~original

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e5...1.jpg~original


You will have to drill through that plug, all the way through and tap it to either M8 or M10.

The M8 nut and bolt that passes through the plug and passenger side mounting bracket will have to be omitted. Drill the holes in the bracket and the housing out to 10mm. Tap the hole in the plug that the M8 bolt goes through out to M10 and replace with two M10*15 bolts. You will need a ~60mm length of tube ID 10mm to put the jamb-nut out beyond the mounting bracket.

The drivers side requires you to remove the cap that is welded into the housing. Either grind through the weld or saw beneath the weld, only cutting the housing and not the cap. The cap will then need a hole drilling in the centre. It has to be removed to keep the swarf out of the grease. Weld an M10 deep nut to a large, thick washer and weld this into the cap so that the M10 screw will pass through it dead centre. Reinstall the cap and reweld it in.

I ground through the weld on the first rack I did, the heat destroyed the foam buffer. Before rewelding the cap back in, send the rack all the way to the passenger side and push the buffer deep down inside the housing, out of the heat. The rack will move it back to the stop. I glued M8 repair washers to the buffers and profiled the ends of the screws to suit. I used M10 studding, and cut 8mm spanner flats for the adjustment/jamb.

Matt

i am printing this now as my rack will be on the workbench tomorrow. Timing is perfect.

Your written description is great. If you happen to post a few pics to that would be awsome. Ecelent job.

i took pics of the whole disassembly.....i will try to post them tonight.


piece of cake......

yes please this will be most usable.

I'll take that as a thankyou :)

yes, thank you for the writeup... the part it helped me understand was what to do with the grub screw plate... I will try to get pix together today or this weekend

ted



btw.... mine feels smooth as silk now. and i thought it was smooth before :D

Picked up an old rack for $50.00 going to try this my self as well. I have to order a new boot for it first. Now I just need a printer.......

i saw boots on thesamba.com for $18 each NOS.......

ted

Awsome! Thanks. By the way. If you need bearings let me know I have this place here in Austin TX. that can get just about any type of bearing. Once I have my rack apart I will let you know which ones are available and how much they are.

Hey Ted what about those pictures?

What substance or product would you recomend for removing all the old grease from the rack?

i pushed a rag thru the housing with a long wooden dowel rod and soaked the rag with penetrating oil a little first...... the rest of the parts i physically wiped all the old grease off.

pics are uploading now.

i was trying to post pictures.......... admin has to turn on IMG tags or something.

You could try posting them either as links to an image hosting site or as attachments wich will be restricted in size.

Here is the gallery at least.
Rack and Pinion

Great! Your pictures more or less tell the story. Only one question. Picture 2402. What is this little tube and where did it come from in relation to the rack? Heh all we need to do now is have some one sketch an exploded veiw of the rack and pinion for the super beetle.

Good work on the pics. :agree:

DOH, sorry about that.......... it is a piece of bronze bushing i used to knock stuff out like the pinion shaft.........

ps....exploded view......got me thinkin now.

An exploded veiw with a pictoral and written step by step would go a long way to helping our VW brothers and sisters in saving a huge amount of time and money. If you consider how hard it is to 1 find a rack in the fist place and 2 have it be in good shape. Plus if you find a good one they want to much for it. Forget rebuilt ones they often want way to much and are often rebuilt badly.

this is something i should be able to do in the near future. But i have to get my car back on the road first.


;) it is my daily driver and it's been layed up for almost 2 months

Totaly understand. That is why I just went out and got a whole other frame to work on and modd. That way I can just swap my body over when I am done.

Woo Hoo!! The boot arrived. Going to tear down my rack tomorrow. Going to replace every bearing in the thing and regrease it.

Ok so the good news is that my rack is in pretty good shape. Just a little rust, one factory burr on one of the racks teeth and a little wear on the pinion. Getting new bearings next week. Pinion wear on this rack consists of a burr edge along each tooth where each side meets the flat top of the tooth. This will need to be filed and removed. A basic diagram of this is attached to this post as viewed from the end on.

The bad new is that the foam stops are completely destroyed. Fell to peices because some mechanic or PO repacked the rack with a grease that was to caustic. I need to know how thick these peices are in centimeters. Are they both the same thickness or is one thicker. As it stands I am going to have to make new stops out of something. Perhaps some urethane......

Matt. One question which way did you drift the needle bearing out? From the inside out or the outside in? Plus any suggestion as to what tools to use to do this.

I would make them out of urethane possibly. They were about and inch thick if i remember correctly. i think i knocked the needle bearing out from the inside out.

Now I just need to find something made out of uerthane. Perhaps some bushing or such though I would prefer to use something that does not have a hole drilled in it....... Hmmmmmm

Ok found some uerethane that should work just need to cut it to size. I may mount it to a metal cup win a three coil spring attached to it to give it some springy resistance. [//[( kinda like that. I will have a better drawing up later when I am not at work. LOL

yea, urethane is mostly not very compressable.... the spring idea seems like it could work as long as there isnt a chance of the cup and urethane pivoting inside there and ending up sideways..........

How springy and squishy were the foam stops?

they were like....maybe as springy as the bottom of an air sole running shoe...... (best thing i can think of off hand to compare)

i would imagine a urethane type rubber would work though.

Right. Adding a spring is going to make the stops to wide. Just going to have to be a chunk of uerthane.

Mat could you draw a simple diagram of how the studs from your steering stop mod interact with the foam bump stops? Kind of like a side cut away of what is going on inside.

I used stainless steel washers, they were bonded to the stops with glue. The washers are 28mm with a 6mm hole. The studs were filed to have a nipple that turns in the washer, nothing special.

Green is weld. Jamb nut not shown.

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e5...r.jpg~original