My 180 has been suffering from very light steering, and finally found the cause, as the round bushing holding it down was too big. The bushings are for an S13, and I'm suspecting my 180 to have a different rack. Diameter is 48mm. Can anyone chime in on this?
Sounds like you might have a later model steering rack fitted which is narrower on the part it clamps too. From memory the difference is about 3mm roughly so you can shim it or get a bush that fits. Having this loose would cause more of a sloppy feeling too the steering rather than making it lighter though so maybe you have another issue. Is the front end aligned properly?
It's a 92 180SX LHD. I have no idea, but I'm thinking the same, as the bushings came off a friends 200SX RHD drifter in which they fit fine, so either he or I have the 14 rack I reckon. Is it safe enough to tape it? I would prefer getting a bushing that fits, but I simply don't know which one(13 or 14) to order! I think loose is a wrong word to use. Unpredictable and sloppy is probably better. It was very "alive" under acceleration and high speeds, very scary indeed. We're getting it ready for road inspection, and tried to figure out why the steering was this poor, turns out the wheels could turn 2 mm because the rack was loose, and pushing the wheels made the rack go sideways.
Tape might wear or go bad when it gets wet so if you are going to shim it then do it using a metal sheet strip and make sure it fits nicely round the rack. Personally I would think that an s14 Bush (think superpro make them) should solve the problem
True. Thanks! I'm going to order superpro from Driftworks, but I want to make sure I'm putting the correct ones on there. Do you know if the S14 is bigger or smaller?