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MG MGB Technical - Dsmantling a collapsible steering column

Hi,

I have a later steering column, the ones with the honeycomb sections and 'glue' together sections. What is the order for dismantling - to refurbish and are there any problematic things I should look out for.
Iwan Jones

There is a circlip at the UJ end. That holds back a strong spring, you may have to devise a plate to compress that a bit more and hold it back while you remove the circlip (see later). The problem with mine was that the shear pins had sheared for some reason which gave some rotational play at the wheel (although not enough to get even an MOT advisory), so the spring was pushing the lower half of the shaft out which caused me problems in removing the column from the car. The plate that secures the bottom of the column to the toe board was also detached, so if yours doesn't have either of those faults there may be other aspects I didn't come across.

The upper half of the column runs in a bearing that is retained in the outer by a circlip, but even removing that circlip although it moved up and down a bit I couldn't remove it. However! It has just occurred to me that perhaps the steering lock had engaged, which wasn't something that occurred to me at the time, as the lock had never worked before and still doesn't. I repaired the shear pins and on reassembly I had to compress the spring with a plate that fitted over the rack end of the shaft in order to refit the circlip. More here http://www.mgb-stuff.org.uk/suspensiontext.htm#repair
Paul Hunt

Hi Paul, thanks for the info, it is this top section of the steering (the one you say you didn't remove) that needs to come out.

I also need to put the shear section back together. Any ideas?

Ta
Iwan Jones

As far as getting the upper section out try putting the ignition key in the lock and turning the ignition 'on', which is something I omitted to do. For the other did you look at that link? That covers both repair and reassembly.
Paul Hunt

Hi,

Thanks for the info, however the steering lock is not on, the lower section springs etc are all off. I have the circlip off the upper section. This is section where the steering lock would be fitted; unfortunately I cannot remove the steering column. There seem to be some bushes held in with two aluminium rivets. Do I drill these out?
Iwan Jones

That's where I stopped, so can't help you.
Paul Hunt

This thread was discussed between 12/12/2014 and 23/12/2014

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