1994 2wd leveling kit. Drop Pitman arm? Solid/stiffer rag joint?

[remington115]

Hello so I’m on a mission to get this little jem back on the road and riding right. So far, I’ve installed a rancho leveling kit (springs and new shocks). To me it looks as though it could use and extra 1in to 1.5in in the front compared to the back. Gunna throw some washers under the coils. I’ve got new upper and lower ball joints, new ties rods and drag, link, radius arm bushings, wheel bearings, and yes they are properly preloaded. I’ve got it aligned specs are 1° of positive camber(as the coil settle ) castor is at 3.5 both sides, and toe is factory spec. Here’s my issue. It still seems a little wandering on the road especially when you hit bumps a.k.a. bump steer. I found a 2 to 6 inch drop Pittman arm from pro comp hoping this helps get the steering angles a little better to help control that bump steer. Also, I was just curious about using a 4 x 4 Pitman arm as it seems to be more dropped then a 2wd. Is this possible? Or should I just go with the 2 to 6 from Procomp? Another thought that crossed my mind was maybe I should take a look at my rag joint in the steering shaft? Does anyone know if there’s an aftermarket rag joint that replaces it with a billet/solid/stiffer?

 

[Curious Hound]

Truck looks great the way it is in my opinion. A few thoughts.

1. If you only lift the front 1 or 1 1/2", but use a 2" drop pitman arm, you may be overcorrecting and still have the same issue "if" that is part of the problem. Definitely don't use a 6" pittman arm. That's way too much.

2. If you want 1" lift in the front, don't use 1" of washers. That would be too much. Since the axle beam extends past the point where the springs/washers are miunted, the effect is multiplied.

3. Make sure your akignment is dialed in before looking for other tricks.

4. You can rebuild your intermediate steering arm using u-joints instead of rag joints. Articles in the tech library and in peoles build threads in the forums. I did mine.

5. Under the best of conditions, you may still feel as if the steering is loose. We often say you don't steer Ford trucks, especially with TIB or TTB front suspensions. You herd them in the right general direction. These are not Porsches or BMWs. They are trucks.

Spend some time reading articles here;

Wheels, Tires, Brakes & Steering - The Ranger Station

Ford Ranger wheels, tires, brakes, and steering tech library with fitment guides, upgrades, troubleshooting, calculators, and diagrams.

www.therangerstation.com

 

[remington115]

So the pro comp drop pitman says it’s for 2-6in of lift but the actual drop in the pitman arm is 3in. But yes I can see doing to much drop will put the steering linkage to low. My hope is the coil lift and adding the washers for an additional lift will get me to the new 3in drop pitman arm length and hopefully get steering linkage horizontal.

I’ll do some more research on the rag joint to u joint too because I definitely think there is some slop in this 34year old trucks raggy saggy joint. Probably the upper u joint as well.

Yea I get it’s a truck but I’ve had a lot of rangers in the past and the steering and bump steer was way better then how this truck is taking it. Thus throwing the parts counter at the front end haha .
Thanks for the insight too!

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

If the 4x4 pitman has more drop than the 2wd one, I’d probably start there and see how it looks/acts. Been a long time since I messed with pitman arms on these, been dealing with other stuff so I don’t really remember specifics offhand. You do want the steering linkage to be relatively in line with the axle beams to eliminate as much bump steer and all as possible.

Also, the steering box may need adjusting. You have to be careful adjusting it because if you make it too tight, you can break the sector shaft. My usual method is to get a helper to wiggle the steering wheel while I adjust out any slop. When I say wiggle the wheel, I mean with the motor off and the column unlocked, move it back and forth just to the point it wants to move the tires. There’s a slotted stud and nut on top of the steering box. Hold the slotted stud with a screwdriver and back the nut off with a wrench. Turn the slotted stud until you get most/all of the slop out and stop. Hold the stud in place when you tighten the nut.

Definitely replace the rag joint with a U-joint. It will transfer more vibration through the steering but give a firmer feel.

 

[remington115]

I just don't know if the 4x4 pitman arm will fit the splines on the Box, just looking at the rock auto pictures it does drop more, where the 2wd looks almost flatish. I just figure if I lift the truck roughly 3 inches then I would need to have a 3 in drop pitman arm. Looking at my set up now my steering linkage is not matching the TTBeams as far as horizontal. its angled up toward the pitman arm. But yes ill definitely check the box adjustment too! completely spaced on looking at that!!

 

[Curious Hound]

I'm pretty sure nearly all Rangers, Bronco IIs, Explorers and probably lighter F series used the same steering gearbox until they started the torsion beam suspensions with rack & pinion steering.

 

[scotts90ranger]

Eric is correct, the only oddball is the manual steering box on the Rangers, they have a different output than the power steering boxes and are near unobtanium apparently...

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

Yeah, the power steering box that was used on the Ranger up to 97 was also used on the Bronco II (all years), first gen Explorer, F-150 (80-96), F-250 to F-550 (80-97), Full Size Bronco, and E-series vans.