I have a mid 80's VW Golf steering rack, rear steer as I am using Corolla GT-S (GTi) converted struts that are also rear steer, naturally. I am going to have to shorten the rack about 6".

Anyway, when I wind on the tie rods to the steering rod/rack and tighten them down they appear to preload the balljoint to the point that it's impossible to move the tie rod ... not good.

A fix would be to use some thin jam nuts to lock the threads before the inner balljoint preloads. I've seen such things on a Triumph Spitfire rack but I wondered if anyone has seen them for other racks? The threads on this rack appear to be M22x1.5mm.

I will also have to lengthen the tie rods themselves so I'm also interested in hearing from others if there's another way of killing both birds with one stone? I have some ideas but they generally involve some major surgery ... such as making a clevis for the end of the steering rod and using bearing rod ends at each end of the tie rod.

I can probably take a pic and upload it if that'll help.

-Steve

[Edited on 12/9/2005 by Sven]