The tool in the face is always a great gag.

My favorite is when you're working above in some awkward spot and accidentally let go of the tool. Happened a lot more on jacks than it does on the lift. Close your eyes wait for the pain hope it glances off of something before it hits. No permanent damage yet.

 

Using John Pirtle's article for this whole thing made me want to amend one section... leaving the sway bar hanging. The first night I dove into this, I left the bar hanging and had a nice little impact on the head with it when I moved it without realizing it wasn't secured to anything! Out came the droplink bolts after that!

 

Car is back down on the ground, but appears to have some toe out. I assume this is because it's been up in the air for a while and because the rack position has changed slightly due to new bushings?

Either way it is going in for an alignment once I get the suspension to settle. I plan on hooning it in an abandoned parking lot down the road to speed up the process.

 

Bump.

Shouldn't the wheels be toed in when the car is lifted rather than toed out?

 

Just take it in for an alignment and end this drama.

 

What drama? I said it was going in for an alignment. This is my first steering rack job on a 928. 944s were my fancy before, and this is a LEARNING experience, not to mention I cleaned the **** out of everything under there.

 

Unless you were very precise with your setting of the toe angle I would not worry about this too much. I used sewing thread, wrapping it around the car at the midpoint of each wheel, and just set the toe as close to zero as possible. Had the front wheels sitting on cardboard squares so I could adjust the toe. I drove it a few hundred miles this way, as the tires were already worn, and it drove fine. Turns out using my quick and very dirty approach was 0.5 degree out for each side. At least I was consistent!

I would just get it aligned, unless you are way out it will be fine driving to the shop.

 

Thanks. I will see if I can get the suspension to relax a little bit more and then go in for a full alignment. Worse case scenario is I tear the tires up. No big deal as the rubber is 8 years old anyways and mis-matched with the rears (Fuzion UHP in the rear).

 

What drama? Seems like every time you turn a wrench, something goes wrong. Bybthe way, you need good tires to get a proper alignment. Chew them up and it won't align properly.

 

Bumping my steering rack thread.

I have developed a leak at the crush washers where they connect to the rack with the banjo bolts. The puddle from the leak is literally almost 3" in diameter after parking and shutting the car off. Mark had provided me some sort of paste to use on these copper washers (which are NEW) to make them a little more sticky and I think seal them better. When checking under the car I confirmed torquing (I used 22 lbs/ft IIRC initially) the banjo bolts right but I am still losing fluid! Most of the loss occurs when the car is running and the system is pressurized.

Are there any other recommendations on another type of sealant I can use on crush washers? Never had an issue like this before after cracking lines loose.

Looking through the search it looks like others have encountered this issue but the threads did not conclude a fix.

 

Andy--

I've gotten in the habit of coating the threads and the washer faces with Teflon thread sealing paste. On the threads, it will block low-pressure fluid migration. On the washer faces, it adds a sealing film, plus lubricates the faces so they don't gall as you tighten. Adjust tightening torque down about 10% to allow for the more slippery threads and friction faces.

The paste is from Home Depot, Oatey brand, in a small squeeze tube in the plumbing repair section. Grey and white tube.

 

Genius!!! I am off to Home Depot before work in the morning.

 

Those F'n copper washers like to leak. You could try taking them off, heating them up red hot and let them cool down on their own. This will soften them up in case they got hard over time .

 

I'm not sure how they could have hardened if they were sitting in a package brand new in a warehouse. I suppose it's possible. I'm not familiar with science behind hardening metals in relation to time, but rather heat and annealing.

I'm going to try Dr. Bob's remedy first and see what happens next. Funny thing is, this car's suspension is settled (after driving over 120 total miles) and ready for an alignment, only to have me crawl back under it. It's going in for the alignment first before I jack it up again.

 

Are the mating surfaces flat and smooth (free of groves made by the old washers)? If unsure, run a sharpening stone over them.