Dino Saga 051113 Lets look at some of the things that go wrong with the Dino front end. It is simple, rugged and the geometry has seldom been bettered. The original ball joints were the only parts in the car that needed regular greasing and some owners are lax. My Dinos first owner was lax and he drove the car hard. He neglected a few other things too. Ive had plenty of chances to use my little tool set. First thing I found was a split right front tie rod bellows. That was easy back in the late 80s; Ford Pinto bellows were an exact match. Bought one and put in new gear oil. Next was left front bearings. Turns out they were standard bearings and my local front end shop changed them in a day. Then left front brake line started to leak right at caliper fitting. That I had to buy from a Ferrari dealer. Only bought one since right one looked fine. 15 years later it still does. I have greased ball joints every 3000 miles or twice a year. One day I had the right front wheel off and noticed some play when moving the disk. Turns out that rack end of tie rod was moving up and down. Looked in the book and the drawing of the steering gear showed a bushing at the right end of the housing. Must be worn. Book said to return it to factory for rebuild. Ha! Priced a new rack assembly. Got a lot of incentive to see if I could fix things. Lifted right side of car only and let sit for a day. Oil ran left and I pulled boot. Rack could move about 1/16 in any direction. Fished along rack and felt bushing. Noticed that there was a self tapping screw in side of housing right where bushing was. Pulled screw and fished out bushing. I found a steel shell that might have held the bearing but no sign of any bearing material; only the shell. Did not want to remove the tie rod from rack. Looked like that was pretty permanently attached. Cut bushing shell off and took measurements of rack and housing diameters. Had a machine shop turn a Nylon 6 bushing that was a slip fit in the housing and 0.010 loose on the rack. 1 wide seemed about right. Wall section of bushing was about 0.180. Used a hack saw to almost split the bushing. Left a 0.060 wall on one side. Spread bushing and thin wall acted as hinge to allow me to get bushing over rack rod. Slid bushing into housing aligning solid full wall with existing screw hole. Made sure that center of bushing was at screw hole and carefully drilled pilot hole. Installed screw and checked all. Felt good but a little stiff. No more play at wheel. Drove the car and steering got sticky once engine got hot and hot air from radiator warmed rack assembly. It was a stick-slip effect that was very small but VERY annoying. Bushing was obviously too tight. Tipped car on side again, pulled bushing, opened bore another 10 thou and put back together. Just right! I could notice that steering was more precise but not by much. Tie rods sit almost level when car is level so rack movement probably made little difference on straight and level. Play apparently only came in when in roll, bump or rebound and then not very noticeable. I felt better with one less thing to worry about. While I had things apart I took a good look at the tie rod ends. Pulled the boots back and found the right one dry. Left one had lots of grease. Bought and installed two new ones and felt better about that too. The last thing I did was to replace the lower ball joints. These carry the full weight of the car and finally got loose. 180,000 miles can do that no matter how often greased. New joints are greaseless. Cut my grease gun maintenance in half. That I can live with. John Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
