Thread: 2005 Defender steering box issues

Sounds like wear, bearing or worm.
I looked at rebuilding my old one but depending on exchange rates it's probably better to get a new one from Adwest.

They tend to suffer fatigue failures of the sector shaft up around the 400,000km mark too, depending on usage, which steers me towards a new one.

Tightening the end float on the shaft in the box generally has negative long term outcomes
The “wear” that enables tightening is actually terminal. Once the load bearing surfaces within the box are worn enough to allow significant tightening the shaft is shot.

The boxes are not rocket science if you pull it down, but by the time you buy all the requisite parts a new box won’t be that much dearer.

Failure of the shaft leads to , let’s say “steering even more vague than a 75 series Tojo”
Having seen a handful of severed shafts I’d be looking for a new/ low Kay box ?

S

Originally Posted by roverrescue

Failure of the shaft leads to , let’s say “steering even more vague than a 75 series Tojo”
Having seen a handful of severed shafts I’d be looking for a new/ low Kay box ?

S

Yep, having bad a worm bearing fail and seize and punch through the end of the 'box on an F100 @ 90km/h through a corner it definitely gets your attention!!

The gear set in a steering box is made so that there is less backlash in the centre position than at the outer sections, to enable free movement when parking etc but minimise play in the straight-ahead position. It sounds like your box is well worn in the dead-centre position but still tight just off-centre, so adjusting for zero backlash at dead-centre has made it too tight in the less-worn sections just either side of centre. If you back it off so it doesn't bind at 11 o'clock and 1 o'clock, it will be sloppy again at 12 o'clock.
In my experience, these boxes are not worth rebuilding, once they need any sort of repair, the remaining bits are at the end of their life and you end up with leaks you can't get rid of. I'd buy a brand new OEM replacement.

fThanks for the responses. I played around with different settings and it is either too tight to self center or too loose at speed. I decided to go with a refurbished box as genuine LR seem to be hard to come by on short notice and Adwest cost more kidneys than I have.

Originally Posted by jbe

fThanks for the responses. I played around with different settings and it is either too tight to self center or too loose at speed. I decided to go with a refurbished box as genuine LR seem to be hard to come by on short notice and Adwest cost more kidneys than I have.

Did you check the nut and lock washer on the bottom of the steering box holding the pitman arm on?

Get someone to turn the wheel while you have a sticky beak........... you might be surprised.

DL