72 Newport made it home

[Jon O.]

The Newport made it from Pennsylvania to Indiana just fine. It does have a few issues though. The steering is extremely touchy. Down the highway you barely move the wheel and you are in the other lane, what could cause overly easy steering?

 

[david hill]

The Newport made it from Pennsylvania to Indiana just fine. It does have a few issues though. The steering is extremely touchy. Down the highway you barely move the wheel and you are in the other lane, what could cause overly easy steering?

The Newport made it from Pennsylvania to Indiana just fine. It does have a few issues though. The steering is extremely touchy. Down the highway you barely move the wheel and you are in the other lane, what could cause overly easy steering?

Glad you made it home safely. When you get a chance, check over your steering linkage front end. If you need help PM me as we live in the same city

 

[live4theking]

Glad you made it safe and sound.

 

[65sporty]

Great that you made it home, check the steering over like Dave said, but how old are you Jon? I don't know how many old cars you have driven, but most drive and feel very different to modern cars. Very easy and loose feeling to most.

 

[Davea Lux]

Usually, oversensitive steering will be the result of the lash adjustment on the steering gear being set too tight. The lash adjuster on these older Mopars is spring loaded, if the spring is fully compressed, there is no free play in the gear and oversensitive steering is the result. Your front end might also be badly out of alignment which can also cause erratic steering, especially if the front wheels are "toed out." I would start with checking tire pressure and then take it to a good front end shop to have the alignment checked.

Dave

 

[mrfury68]

Glad you made it safe & sound. Check over your front end as mentioned, as well as other things you want to be sure are working as they should. You will learn as you go, just as we all did at one time or another. Have fun!

 

[1978 NYB]

The Newport made it from Pennsylvania to Indiana just fine. It does have a few issues though. The steering is extremely touchy. Down the highway you barely move the wheel and you are in the other lane, what could cause overly easy steering?

That is normal steering. You'll get use to it.

 

[david hill]

Glad you made it home safely. When you get a chance, check over your steering linkage front end. If you need help PM me as we live in the same city

Glad you made it home safely. When you get a chance, check over your steering linkage front end. If you need help PM me as we live in the same city

Jon, have seen this before. First a through suspension and steering linkage inspect. You will be surprised how a combination of worn front end parts can cause this. Nothing normal about it. As I said in my previous post PM me if you need help.

 

[CBODY67]

For good measure, DO look to see what everything is in the front end. With age, the rubber bushings will "settle out" as they age with the weight of the car on them. The upper control arm bushings AND the pivot bushing in the lower control arm. If there are some "weather cracks", that's about normal, but if there are any missing "chunks", that's cause for concern.

Your "over-sensitivity" could be the higher level of boost the earlier cars generally had, or it might be the toe-in adjustment a little out of spec, such that when one wheel gets on a different surface, if it's a gripper surface, the car heads in that direction.

Those Chryslers were sometimes "a target" for front end mechanics, as many lower ball joints were replaced when they were "in spec" and NOT worn. There is a spec for their "looseness", that's normal in the manner it is checked.

The steering adjustment can be a little loose, too, but adjust that sparingly. There are two adjustments, one on the input side (forward of the rag joint) and the one on top that everybody knows about. But with the mileage your can has, the box is far from worn out, typically. But "a touch" more on the center adjusting stud might not hurt, but if the return of the steering wheel from a turn doesn't happen, then it's too tight. In many cases, it's the input-side adjustment that needs attention instead. Note if when you turn the wheel from side-to-side (from center), the steering column (at the gear input) moves in and out before the steering gear moves the steering linkage. The "spanner nut" adjustment, I believe, it's called.

AND, it could also be the brand of tires and their tread design! Make sure the front tires are also inflated to 30-32psi cold, for good measure.

In the mean time, get it all checked-out and see what it's "made of". A few quirks you can PM me about.

Enjoy!
CBODY67

 

[Davea Lux]

Another thing that you might check is to be sure you have tires that are not mismatched. By this I mean steel radials and fabric radials on the same car. That can cause all sorts of interesting handling issues.

Dave

 

[Carmine]

Might what you experienced be described as lot of movement in the steering wheel with little effect, then suddenly the wheels begin to steer and you have to correct the other way? In other words, "non-linear" steering feel?

If that's the case, you're looking at worn out front end parts. The easiest to check (and fequent offender) is the idler arm. It's a piece of linkage that should mirror the action of the pitman arm (driven from the steering gearbox). If it gets sloppy, movement feels delayed and then "sudden" as the slop is taken up.

While this car will never steer like a modern rack and pinion, it should feel linear and not wander.

 

[Jon O.]

Let me give a better description of the steering. My dad says it is not normal, and my uncle says thats how power steering was in the past. When you are driving it is a little hard to keep in the lane. It seems to have too much play before you start turning. It seems to get worse the faster that you go. When you barely touch it left, it drifts and kind of keeps floating in that direction. When you correct it, it is very easy to over do it. I usually barely tap the wheel in the other direction and move back into the play zone. Other than that it was a nice ride home. Like driving your couch down the highway!

 

[70bigblockdodge]

I agree mostly with Carmine, it should not be work to drive, a 911 Porche or Triumph spitfires it ain't.
I'll give you the most likely cause barring worn parts ( lower control arm bushings being the most likely cause).
The alignment is wrong, mostly because it was done at a pep boys type place. Go Google and search out Mopar Action alignment specs and then have those put in the car after you fix any worn parts.
I will give you another piece of advice from my cheap *** to a young man that probably does not have extra to spend. Jack the car with weight on control arms and using a pry bar wiggle suspension parts to check ball joints tie rod ends and idler and pitman arms. If there is no movement in the joints they are good, new parts will not make it any better.
Most likely cause is bad bushings and pitman/idler arms.

 

[Carmine]

It seems to have too much play before you start turning. ...When you barely touch it left, it drifts and kind of keeps floating in that direction. When you correct it, it is very easy to over do it. I usually barely tap the wheel in the other direction and move back into the play zone.

Here is your word for the day:

hysteresis, n

1. A property of a system such that an output value is not a strict function of the corresponding input, but also incorporates some lag, delay, or history dependence, and in particular when the response for a decrease in the input variable is different from the response for an increase.

Jack the car with weight on control arms and using a pry bar wiggle suspension parts to check ball joints tie rod ends and idler and pitman arms. If there is no movement in the joints they are good, new parts will not make it any better.
Most likely cause is bad bushings and pitman/idler arms.

Yes.

 

[Jon O.]

Ok I tried looking around at things and the problem seems to be where the wheel goes into the power steering box. The wheel makes a quarter turn before anything happens. It seems to click a little then start to move the wheels. Do you think that the power steering may be bad? Or nothing is wrong and I am not used to it?

 

[Davea Lux]

Ok I tried looking around at things and the problem seems to be where the wheel goes into the power steering box. The wheel makes a quarter turn before anything happens. It seems to click a little then start to move the wheels. Do you think that the power steering may be bad? Or nothing is wrong and I am not used to it?

Your steering gear is out of adjustment. Assuming that you steering gear is not leaking or otherwise showing signs of distress, you should be able to adjust it. Jack the car up so that the weight is off the wheels. Center the wheels so that the car would be going in a straight line. There is a stud with a jam nut on the top of the steering gear, loosen the jam nut. The stud will have either a screw slot or a hex fitting, insert the proper tool and turn the stud clockwise until it won't turn any farther. Now back the stud off one half turn and re-tighten the jam nut. Start the car and turn the steering wheel from right to left, it should turn freely with no binding. If you feel binding, back the stud off in quarter turn increments until the wheel turns freely. When you are satisfied that your gear is not binding, test drive the car, there should be a noticeable improvement. Also check the basics, such as the wheel bearing adjustment and tire pressure. If you have any confusion about the gear adjustment, the FSM has the detailed procedure. One note of caution, if the gear was rebuilt at some point, the specs given in the FSM might not be accurate as the re-builder might not have used a lash adjustment spring with factory specs.

Dave

 

[70bigblockdodge]

Steering box is worn. The adjustment described above is okay but more than likely the preload on the input shaft bearings is lost and the input shaft will walk in and out as wheel is moved left-right-left. This adjustment can really not be done practically on the car and requires a special spanner wrench that could be made but using it on the car is almost impossible.

 

[Carmine]

There could also be an issue with the rag joint.

 

[Jon O.]

Steering box is worn. The adjustment described above is okay but more than likely the preload on the input shaft bearings is lost and the input shaft will walk in and out as wheel is moved left-right-left. This adjustment can really not be done practically on the car and requires a special spanner wrench that could be made but using it on the car is almost impossible.

It does walk out just a tiny bit, adjusting it did help, but I only did it a little. What would be the best thing to do here? It scares me a bit. Driving on the street is fine, but the highway kind of drifts

 

[Davea Lux]

It does walk out just a tiny bit, adjusting it did help, but I only did it a little. What would be the best thing to do here? It scares me a bit. Driving on the street is fine, but the highway kind of drifts

Probably want to get the alignment checked before proceeding further. Some end play in the input shaft is normal, grab hold of the input shaft and see if you can shake it up and down, while your at it shake the input shaft ahead of the input coupling, you should not have any play in either.

Dave