1265R is now in my garage

[Richard48Y]

I tend to try to center the MASS of an engine more than the crank centerline.
Not fun if they suddenly rotate hard when not planned or expected.
Renault are pretty light so less of an issue but still a consideration.

[dakazman]

   I used clear, hi heat , engine paint from a rattle can . So far it’s working very well and not yellowing
You can sand out some of those casting flaws or use a file then blast area again to match.
   Rich,
   I’ll give that another try . I think I had a shortage of metric bolts at the time to mount that way.
It would make building it easier.
Dakazman

[GavinT]

I must say that fan shroud looks brilliant, Gideon.
I've been eyeing off those wet blasting cabinet conversions too.

[gideon]

Thanks Gavin.  I converted a Harbor Freight 40lb blasting cabinet, and I feel like I've spent a lot of time sorting out the blasting cabinet while the car project lingers.  I still have a few small leaks.  If I had to do it again I'd use pop rivets to assemble the cabinet - it comes with a pile of tiny, fiddly little nuts and bolts that you have to hold on both sides, somehow, and take forever to assemble.  This could turn into a separate thread, but it's been done a hundred times before elsewhere.

[gideon]

Before and after shots of the rear hub carriers.

[gideon]

I'm in the process of stripping down the steering rack.  The manual says the following

Remove the circlip and withdraw the pinion assembly, taking care not to lose the dowel peg.

but the pinion doesn't want to budge, and I'm wondering if I've missed something or if I'll need to find the old steering coupling so I've got something to bolt onto the end of the pinion shaft, so I can apply some more welly?

[4129R]

Apply heat. Then I seem to recall there is a hole in the back so you can carefully drift it out.

[BDA]

It's been a while since I rebuilt mine but IIRC the circlip is the only thing keeping the pinion in the housing. That's not quite true because I think the pinion needs to be turned while you pull it out.

I would squirt some penetrating oil down in there and grab the knurled shaft with pliers and try pulling while you rotate back and forth. It might help on the margins if you were to take the rack adjustment "shoe" (underneath the cap nut, spring?, and shims) out and also take out the dowel that sits between the housing and the retaining ring (it keeps the retaining ring from spinning). Don't loose that (or be ready to make a new one!).

[gideon]

So I applied a lot of penetrating oil and later I applied some heat, but still couldn't budge it.  Then it occurred to me that an open ended spanner might slip around the 'waist' of the pinion shaft, and then I could lever it out without damaging the splines.  A 1/2" spanner fits about right, and using an assortment of other spanners as pivots I was able to lever it out.  I don't think I would ever have gotten it out with just a straight pull.

[BDA]

Pretty clever of you! Congratulations! 

[jbcollier]

Be careful about blasting the rack hosing.  Blasting grit can get imbedded and work loose later to the detriment of your rack.  You can still blast but make sure you seal the openings.

[gideon]

I got around the reassembling the steering rack.  The workshop manual describes using a feeler gauge to "measure the gap between the sleeve nut flange, lock tab and cup nut face" then figure out the correct amount of shims for the ball joint.  I didn't have much luck with that method - it always seem to lock the ball joint solid - so I just removed the thin shims one at a time then reassembled and tested again until the ball joint no longer locked up.  Feeling happy with that I hammered the lock tabs flat and put the boots on (bit of a struggle getting the left hand boot on).

The manual goes on to say

Test adjustment by applying a load of 8 lb. (3.629 kg.) at the outer end of the tie-rod, when the tie-rod should articulate freely.
If necessary, adjust the shim pack until correct operation is obtained.

When I did this test I got movement with about 1 lb of weight added to the end of the tie-rod.  That seems a lot less than the 8 lbs mentioned in the manual, but the 8 lbs figure appears to be a maximum and no minimum is specified.  So this is one of those things where experience matters.  Do I need to take it apart again and add shims until it's closer to the 8 lb figure?  If so, how much closer? 

Yes, I should have carefully read the whole manual section before doing anything irreversible like hammering lock tabs. 

[BDA]

When I was taking my car apart, the rack was one of the first assemblies that was attacked. I regreased everything and when it came to the tie rods, I thought as long as there was no play, I thought "why would I make it tighter than it needed to be." So mine were very loose when I installed it on the car. It was horrible! At highway speeds, it wanted to jump into the next lane. The next time, I estimated what the force was to hold a gallon of water and shimmed to that. I was still unhappy with it so the last time, I used a spring scale and it's much better. I can't say that all of the unhappiness I blamed on the rack was actually due to the rack. I subsequently found out my shocks were shot and that could have been a cause for a lot of it. My advice is invest in a spring scale of some type and do your due diligence to get it reasonably close. The 8 lbs. they mention in the manual isn't called a max value.

I know it's overkill but my memory was that the tie rod cap nut was red Loctited originally. I know it's overkill but I continued the practice.

One confusing thing about rebuilding the rack for me was specifying "Cap nut Head/pinion housing clearance" and the resistance to turning the pinion (2 lb. at 8"). Those seemed to be two ways of measuring the same thing and they did not line up for me (shimming to get the gap they specified did not give me the resistance called for) so I chose to shim the pinion cap nut so that I got the resistance the manual called for. It seems to work! 

r.d. has all the shims and lock tabs handy.

[gideon]

I got some more shims and lock tabs, disassembled one tie rod and added one 0.002" shim and measured the force required to move the outboard end of the tie rod.  With the extra 0.002" shim the force required went up from about 1lb to somewhere between 14 and 24lbs, depending on the position.   It's a bit looser in the middle and tighter at the ends of the range.  I double checked it by removing the shim and re-measuring then adding the shim and re-measuring.  It's a repeatable result. 

So, is it better to be too loose or too tight.  What do you think?

[BDA]

It's been a long time since I did mine but it sure seemed like I had more control over how much resistance was felt. A jump from 1 lb. to 14 lbs. is pretty stout! Did you grease the cup, tie rod ball, and cup nut interior? Did you remember the spring under the cup? I suspect there is something you're missing. The shims are really tensioning the spring under the cup so there shouldn't be huge jumps in resistance. Maybe your spring has collapsed? If so, I would try to expand it a bit. Make sure the hole for the spring is clean. Is it in coil bind when you tighten it down? Could the spring be caught on something so it won't compress? I really think there's something wrong with the spring and the way it's compressing or not compressing. Check that over carefully.

If you are sure you have everything right and you're still going from 1 lb. 14 lbs. resistance at the end of the tie rod, I'd go with the 14 lbs. got all of that and you're still seeing a jump from 1 to 14 lb. from a 0.002 shim, I'd go with the 14 lb. setup. 1 lb. is definitely too loose.