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Sticking steering


Andy69

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1992 Supersport with a 1.4 K
 

Took the car to the autocross this weekend.  An odd thing happened.  The steering stuck for a moment a couple of times.  Went to turn left and it wouldn’t turn, turned harder and it broke free.  Happened once more, not as bad, but still required more effort to break it free, after that it was fine.  No obvious things wrong with the wheel or column that I could see without taking anything apart.  The car was fine on the drive home and I took a good hard look at it and there aren’t any noises or anything indicating anything wrong.  Nothing near the column that might catch on it somehow.  I also couldn’t get it to do it while parked so I could see what it was doing.

 

Any ideas?

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I have 2 new Caterham steering racks. I think both wide track. Not sure if they'd work with your '92. Not sure what ratio either. A bit less than 2 turns lock to lock, per my amateurish attempt to measure. I bought one for my '97 years ago but never installed it, the other came as a spare with my current wide track Caterham.

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Andy69,

Racks will often stick if involved in a hit that deforms one of the teeth, then it's time to bin it. If you're planning on rebuilding the rack I'd mock it up with some light oil and check for sticking. If it passes make sure you have both the rack and pinion magnafluxed before final assembly. The results of a sheared tooth are never good.

 

Another possibility is that the rack has adjustable pinion depth. It's possible that the pinion is not secured and the tooth engagement is changing when you're steering leading to binding/unbinding. May want to check that out.

 

Andy

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