'56 Truck steering issues

I've owned this truck for 4 months and decided to take it to my regular old school mechanic to see if he could improve the steering. The front axle is a Dana 44 from a '73 Scout. (It has a Chevy 350 engine, so not tons of extra space under the hood) A bump in the road at anything over 30 MPH causes the truck to lurch sideways. My mechanic pointed out that turning the steering wheel moves the front of the frame up or down, depending on which way the wheel is turned. With the truck sitting still he turned the wheel as I watched the frame move, so I know it is happening! This appears to be due to the angles required to attach the stock pittman arm to whatever it attaches to. The only solution he could come up with is to have a machine shop fabricate a different shaped pittman arm. I'm not expecting to have much luck finding a machine shop that is interested in solving my problem so I thought I'd ask here if anyone has another solution.

The mechanic suggested I could play around with removing some of the front springs so it doesn't bounce so much. I guess I should state that I'd be happy with any improvements to the handling if I can't find an easy solution to the entire steering problem.

I don't plan to be doing any serious off roading and am mostly interested in having a truck that drives well on the street, if that helps. I can't imagine this is the first truck with a Scout front axle swapped in so maybe someone has a solution. Thanks.

Hello,

Caster in the front axle causes the vehicle to rise slightly when turning right or left....Normal.. Lurching sideways sounds like one
or both of your axles having broken spring center bolts.. Or other loose broken suspension problems....You need to
get this mess to a professional, school trained mechanic.. I'd look for an alignment shop with a great reputation and a
technician who's been in the business for more than 30 years...Lots of great mechanics were never trained or have
much experience with oddball chassis problems...........Good Luck................

Old-school alignment, frame and axle shops are rare these days, and a lot of shops won't touch custom assemblies because of liability. You might have better luck with a specialty 4x4 shop.

If one or both the sprimg center pins were busted ..the whole axle would skew sideways and truck would never drive straight ...if you could post few pics of your truck ..might be able to see somthing wrong or missing. the stock pitman arm attachs from steering box to the drag link then attahces to a tie rod that ties front wheels together. if any of those several ball joints or bushings are loose, worn, broken,...you are going to have major issues trying to drive.
The steering has to be tight with zero play due to the enormous stress forces involved when turning a tiny 1/16 play on this end here can compound into major play at other end. possibly breaking something while driving.
...i would park it until you can get it looked other by a known proffessional shop that has the equipment to measure angles and such ...and then go to alginment shop after any new parts have been installed.


Larry

Thanks for the advice, guys. I didn't think of taking pictures until I left the mechanic's shop so I'll try to get some on Monday. I may have overstated the problem as I've had the truck up to about 50 MPH without a problem. I just can't relax and must pay attention all the time, which isn't my MO, lol. There is a good, old front end shop that I think will be my next stop. We have taken our work pickups in there with good results but not sure if they will work on the modified Willys. The mechanic also directed me to a speed shop that's been around for at least 30 years.

Yes get us some pics please. Many of us have been doing this for years and we have made our own mistakes and messes in the past. It is how we learn things like keeping the drag link parallel with the axle as much as possible. It really is a geometry thing

one other possibility ....it is possible you may have some Death Wobble occuring.....Death Wobble is cause by loose,... broken,... worn ball joints,.. bushings ,...King pins and all other assoicated parts also incorrect steering /suspension geometry plays a large part in it as well.

In the case of my 51 truck... i had really bad intermittent Wobble that i never knew when it was going to hit or how hard.... anywhere fom 10 to 50 mph truck would shake so hard it nearly rip the steering wheel out of my hands..!! thought for sure something was gonna break and send me into the wall or other vehicles. sometimes i could drivetruck several times with no issue ... then very next time out ....BAM..!!! sometime more than once in same trip..!! nearly got to the point i was afraid to drive truck anywhere. i had thought the 4 mismatched tires and wheels were causing issues..i did not know bout needing perfect geometry on things. ..( sure as Hell do now..)

i took it in for alignment after putting bigger better tires on it.... and asked them to look things over...after telling them bout the bad wobble i was having...

Tech told me to come down in pit and look at something....he turned the wheel sided/side and i could see the draglink moving the steering arm good 1/4inch without moving the wheels..!! Huh..?? 3 upper nuts that hold steering arm the top of knuckle were loose..!! despite being torqued to over 100ft pounds..!! ...did ya use locktite.??.Uh..no i did not..??

Tech says..well i would say that is 90% of your death wobble problem right there..!! and then after some other measurments i found out i had 10.5 degrees of caster angle..!! that was.. BAD..!!

most vehicles have 3-4 degrees of caster angle ..i had 10.5 way too much...!! he says you can go as high as 8 degress but no more..you are asking for lot of trouble..huh.. i already had that ..!! you need caster shims..to roll axle forward few degrees ..to around 4-5 degrees that should cure the Death Wobble you have.

So i had to go home retorque and locktite those nuts...and then go to a spring shop up the road and have some 4 degree shims made..... which after installing these took me from 10.5 degrees to bout 6 degrees caster or so.

been running like this for 4 -5 months now...Zero Wobble ...Hell .. i even did the ultimate test ...that i was fraid to do till now ....took it to work one morning few months ago .. and then made left turn commiting to a short high speed freeway trip....took it up to 70 and geld it there for next 7 miles...

Nothing.!!.. no shimmy, shake Wobbles .. No Nothing ...since then have had it on freeway dozen or so times and feel very confident i have solved my wobble issue.

that was just me and somthing to think bout ..everything steering related needs to be in perfect alignment in very good/near perfect shape ..and uh..Tight..!!

so post some pics when you can and maybe we can help you get this thing sorted out.


Larry

If the toe is off a fair amount (too far pos or neg) that will also cause unexpected lane changes on bumps.

Since it's a custom setup, photos would really help in a diagnosis.

Andy

Here are some pictures showing the pittman arm & the angle of the drag link. From what info I've been able to gather, this severe angle has something to do with the steering deficiencies. My regular mechanic said he talked to a very knowledgeable guy at Advance Adaptors and said they had a kit that would solve the issue. Any thoughts?

It looks to me like the drag link is too long, which is causing the extreme angle of the pittman arm that's shown in the second photo. The steering box needs to be centered in its' travel to work optimally- the pittman arm should be roughly vertical when the front wheels are pointed forward.

I can't think of anything Advance Adapters sells that would help much, since the drag link is a custom piece- the rear half, from the adjuster back, is Willys or something contemporary to it, while the adjuster and front half are from some other vehicle. AA sells Saginaw-style box conversion kits for CJs, but not for pickups or wagons.

Could you post another photo that shows more of the steering knuckle? It doesn't look like a Scout knuckle, unless someone machined the top of the knuckle to accept the Chevy steering arm.

Andy

Here is the best picture I have.

Thanks. That is not a Scout knuckle. Probably off a 1/2 ton Chevy, though could be from an IH pickup, Wagoneer, or a few other sources. Does it still have the 5x5.5 wheel bolt pattern?

On the original Willys axle, the steering arm attaches to the underside of the knuckle, below the axle tube- that puts the drag link roughly parallel to the ground. Having the steering arm on top if the knuckle is putting your drag link at an extreme angle, which would definitely cause some handling issues.

Andy

Thanks Andy for the info. Here's some more info which may explain what vehicles they were picking parts off of. Six bolt.

I'm pretty sure a '76 4x4 Suburban would have had a Dana 44 front end, so there's a chance that the knuckle and spindle assemblies came from that truck (along with the rear axle).

Unfortunately, I don't think there is a solution to your problem that won't require some custom fab work. Shortening the drag link might help matters, but it's likely going to bump steer as long as it's installed at that extreme angle.

You also might be able to source a different steering arm that has more drop, which would lessen the drag link angle, but you'll have to pay attention to how much room you have before the drag link starts hitting the axle tube.

Andy

I put scout Dana 44's into my 49 Jeepster, which is a jeepster body mounted on the Willys pickup frame, shortened by about 14 inches. I had replaced the Ross steering box with a steering box out of a late 50's GMC about 35 years ago, but for the sake of discussion, that shouldn't make a difference. The first picture shows what I started with (including bent drag link) before I installed the front 44 axle. Once I installed the front 44 axle with what I believe was a Chevy arm on the knuckle, the angle was pretty similar to what the OP is dealing with (2nd picture).

After thinking a bunch on how to address it, I found an aftermarket pitman arm that had the right length and angle for this application determined by measurement (3rd picture) and to allow for an offset drag link. BUT the spline count was different than the steering shaft spine count. So I took the original pitman arm and with a hole saw, cut the section out of the original arm so I ended up with a "donut" that retained the original splines in the ID while the OD was significant enough to retain a decent "wall thickness". I then (with the next smaller hole saw) drilled out the splines in the newer pitman arm and finished of the bore remaining, to allow the "donut" insert, to be pressed into the new arm bored hole. I then drilled two holes along the diameter of the "donut" and bored hole, and pressed in two hardened pins (about 1/4 inch in diameter) 180 degrees apart, to pin the "donut" into the bored hole. To finish it off, I welded the donut, pins and pitman arm together with stainless welding rod.

I then made up the drag link with aftermarket parts to match the offset desired to center the pitman arm in its range matching the turning radius of the 44 axle to the full sweep of the pitman arm (which I calculated earlier). After all was done, I test drove about 10 miles and all seemed good. I will take finished pictures later today and post.

Somewhere in this should be some solution for you, if not the entire solution.

Here is where I finished at. It should be the same axle and frame as the OP has.

After you fix the steering linkage you might also consider a damper shock. Mine has a 2 shock setup that controlled the issues I had. It takes bumps at any speeds well and goes down the freeway at 80mph with no problems.

Thanks for all the info. I'm going to wait until after the 4th then decide which way to go but I'm definitely making a change in the steering. Hey Larry with your changes were you able to keep the original steering column? Also is your truck power steering?