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ORD bolt in steering box brace fitment/clearance issues

AJMBLAZER

AJMBLAZER

Better to be lucky than good.
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Okay, so the D60 is hanging from the suspension that has the zero rates installed. The front driveshaft is back in one piece and all looks good. Fenders are trimmed. The new drag link parts are installed and on the truck.

Next step...ORD bolt in steering brace.


Started trying to see where it will fit and realize there's some hard lines in the way.

The two arrows point to the two bolts that will be replaced by the end of the brace that has the two built in spacers. The brace will run to the upper right corner of the picture.
Lines A and B (excuse my poor MS Paint "calligraphy") are the problems. Line C looks like it will be within the half moon hole built into the brace but while B has some movement to it Line A won't move. I can wiggle it a bit but not much.

Mine's an '86 Chevy K30 M1008 CUCV. Dunno if that complicates stuff but so far all seems to be correct...the ORD instructions could use a few more pictures for those of us who are dangerous with tools.

Steering box clearance issues.JPG
 
The one on my K20 took a bit of finaglin to get in there, as I recall I had to drill out one of the holes. I havent got one on my m1008 yet, but that is one of the first mods cause it tightened up my k20 a fair bit.
 
I removed that little clip above the arrow on line"c" and I think there was another one I pulled for the other lines that allowed me to move the other lines, I am not sure it was a while back but I remember it took some fidgeting for me to get it in there as well.
 
I had the same problem with my 87 V-10. On my next day off I will be removing the lines to see if I can get it on.
 
Well...little buzzed right now since the wife wanted to go out to dinner so I think I'll resume the battle tomorrow night...


You know, now I think I remember someone mentioning they had this problem a while back. I think they said they put wiring loom tubing around the lines to keep them from rubbing on the brace.
 
I just put mine in yesterday and ran into that same problem. The one line that was in the way the most was the end of the hard line for the fuel vapor line that goes to the charcoal canister. I just unbolted the clip from the frame and pushed it back by hand. The power steering lines, I just unbolted and bent just slightly to give me the clearance to get the brace in there.

I also had to unbolt the fuel vapor line from the crossmember, as that's right where the other end of the brace bolted.
 
Not sure, but I'd imagine those lines are still bolted to the frame with clamps right there, and loosening the bolts up would give you a lot of play to get things situated right.
 
Ended up unbolting C at the clamp there and had to shove it about half an inch up to fit into the big opening the brace has. Going to try and get something between it and the steel...it's pretty tight against it. So is line A. That sucker is the bain of my existence. Basically why getting the top bolt in took over an hour today. Ended up wedging the brace in position, getting the lower bolt in, and then jamming a screw driver through the hole you have to enlarge in the front crossmember and through that end of the brace. Then I stuck the bolt in the top hole, started prying, twisting, cussing, swearing, and turning the bolt and finally got some threads to engage and start turning. Next was 20 minutes of trying to find a combination of sockets that would fit in there and allow me to turn the bolt.
Had about 7" of sockets, extensions, and adapters going so I could get the torque wrench on there. 80ft/lbs is a bitch in that situation.

Part of the problem is that Lines A and B cross over the crossmember there on the left and then sort of tuck up next to the oil pan lip where the bolts are. A is apparently supposed to go into this spring clip bracket hanging off of one of the oil pan bolts but for some reason is instead wedged between the bracket and the pan. This is probably why A is tighter than...insert anal sex inuendo here. Dinked with the bracket for about 5 minutes and then realized it wasn't the issue at hand.

Tomorrow I drill the hole in the front crossmember and hopefully this little bit of fun is over. Thing better steer like a sports car or I'm gonna be damn annoyed...okay, just have a tighter feel maybe...

Oh yeah and aside from the oil leaks I knew about I see little drips of coolant in a few places...:doah:
 
For what it's worth I'm yet another that is having problems. I am planning on replacing a bunch of hardline because of it.
 
Glad to know I'm not the only one with lines that "aren't in the grainy pictures".



Glad my truck only has 52k on it though. All the bolts so far have come right out. Unfortunately though the truck must have belonged to a tank or armored unit and they used it to follow them around...anyone in Minnesota want their mud/dirt back? Got a lot of it!
 
Fought me every step of the way but as of about 8pm today it is on. The front crossmember's enlarged hole is sorta an oval but hey, the damn thing is in and torqued down to 75ft/lbs.
 
PLACE MONTAGE OF EXPLETIVES HERE

So you renewed my interest in getting my brace on. Wow. I'd rather close my finger in a car door than do that again. What a maternal fornicator that was!

That must be the busiest square footage of space on the truck. There wasn't enough space to turn the top bolt with anything short of a 1/8 sweep. The bolt holding the clamp on the power steering clamp was set below the lines preventing a wrench or socket from gripping the bolt. The hole through the front member was off by a hair, only a hair, but that prevented getting the bolt through despite my swearing.

If that was a common trail fix like a broken stub shaft, I'd take up a new hobby! :D
 
Heh, sounds about like mine.

The annoying part is I know one day I'll have to take the thing off to take the steering box off...crossover is just so much better...but oy I don't want to do that again...
 
AJMBLAZER said:
Heh, sounds about like mine.

The annoying part is I know one day I'll have to take the thing off to take the steering box off...crossover is just so much better...but oy I don't want to do that again...
Click to expand...

Bloody hell, I didn't even think of that. :doah:
 
AJMBLAZER said:
Heh, sounds about like mine.

The annoying part is I know one day I'll have to take the thing off to take the steering box off...crossover is just so much better...but oy I don't want to do that again...
Click to expand...

Eh? IIRC, the brace is on the inside, and the box is on the outside of the frame ... even if you DON'T just swap sector shafts :D, I don't think the brace will move THAT much. Worst case, you take out three of the box bolts, rotate the box down, then put them back into the brace to keep it in place.

-- A
 
Well for whatever its worth, I look under my 91 and the fist thing I saw was brake lines. I figured it would take some work to even come close to getting the brace in there. Lets see some pics of yours once done!!!
 
Damn, never got a notification about any of this.

dremu said:
Eh? IIRC, the brace is on the inside, and the box is on the outside of the frame ... even if you DON'T just swap sector shafts :D, I don't think the brace will move THAT much. Worst case, you take out three of the box bolts, rotate the box down, then put them back into the brace to keep it in place.

-- A
Click to expand...

Don't you have to swap the whole box to a 2wd box?
There's so much crap up there that it'll just not be fun to get those three bolts out. I had a 8" extension on a long socket just to get to the top bolt.


I'll try to get some pictures of the completed job and all the crap in the way tonight or soon.
 
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