Splittychick's splitty is currently in for a wheel alignment. The "technicians' have got the front camber and toe worked out, but they cann't work out how to get the steering wheel straight.

What is the trick to adjusting the position of the steering wheel?

You have to do the alignment point the wheels 'straight ahead'
and then pop the drag
link off and shorten it/lengthen it to get the steering
wheel straight (adjust by winding the ball joint in or out like a tie rod end).

When you say the 'technicians' have the alignment/camber worked
out ........you have to arrange the link pin shims
to get the camber right (after measuring torsion arm offset) and then set the toe-in to 1/8 inch....the techs
are on top of this?

regards

RobK

[ Edited on 18-1-2006 by splitbusaustralia ]

[ Edited on 18-1-2006 by splitbusaustralia ]

I'm not sure how they've done it, but the camber is equal on the front wheels. I don't know what the toe is set at.

They are afraid of popping off the drag link in case it falls apart due to age. Are ball joints still available?

Can anybody recommend a wheel alignment place which knows how to do a splitty properly. When we first took it in, one of the guys pointed out that the air intake tube underneath was broken, he was pointing to the heater duct from the engine to the cab.

Drag links are available new - you can buy one on-line
from wolfsburg west for US$50 if local suppliers don't
have one...mr bug in Dandenong may have em or Roy at ClassicVW...

For the moment if the camber is equal each side I'd leave
that and just do the toe in and adjust the drag link
to get the steering wheel straight.

You can actually set the toe-in quite easily yourself using
an adjustable measuring rod - measure between the front wheel rims
and make sure they're 0 to 1/8 inch closer together at the
front compared to the back.

If the tyres chop out on the edges with an obvious camber or toe-in problem at some point in the future
I'll pull the spindles, measure with the factory tools
and set up the camber and toe-in properly if she brings it to geelong...

regards

robK

Forgive the stupid question but how do you know that the steering wheel has been replaced correctly on the shaft? Seems to me you could have the drag links set so the steering box is in the middle of its range, but the steering wheel could be at any angle. Or is it different with splitties, is there only one way to put the steering wheel on in an angular sense?

in a splitty the steering wheel is positioned by a single woodruff
key rather than a spline arrangement.

Thus the sterring whell will only go on in one
angular position and you have to tweak the drag link length.

I should have mentioned you also need the 'center'
the steering box when you do this

- you'll feel it grab the adjusting pin on the right hand
side of the box when centred

Thanks Rob..I knew I was missing something, as the Bay wheels are multi-splined...

Thanks for the help. I will have a look and see if I can figure out how to do it.