Anyone Replacing Their Steering Rack Bushings w/ 35's?

I upgraded mine a while back with the 35's because I knew it was coming and I had 37's in my cart on several web sites. Worth the upgrade

 

I imagine the theory is just that the heavier tires are putting more of a load on the rack.

 

When you are wheeling offroad and put the truck through it's limits is where the excessive wear comes in. There is a lot more weight on the front end on the sides. If you don't wheel much you should be fine with normal driving, if not replace when needed

 

Thanks again to all that have contributed - this was a big help.

After 3 years of procrastination, i finally got motivated enough to try the bushing swap. Took me a little longer since i rebuilt my UCA;'s while i was doing everything.

Had to make a trip halfway though to get a ball joint separator to get my tie rods loose. Other than that, everything went pretty much like documented. I probably wouldn't want to do it again.. Just a lot of tight work laying on your back.

I had a hard time getting my new sleeves into the the new bushings. Used the bolt and a spacer to press it in on passenger side. Driver side went in easier.

glad to have this off the list and hopefully it makes a difference.

My steering wheel is slightly off. Felt like i had it lined up correctly but obviously not. probably will take shaft loose again and try to move over a tooth or 2, unless that can be corrected with alignment?

 

Bump to the top. I'm about to do this job myself. Had one shop say they have to remove the diff and quoted $700 labor. 4 Wheel parts said they just replace the whole rack but they would try this method based on Energy Suspensions instructions but want to charge 4 hours labor at $150/hr because they don't know how long it will take them. They said they charge 8 hours for a rack replacement labor. I'll update this thread when I finish the job. Thanks for all of the help from everyone and posting to keep this updated.

 

Im curious about this as well. A shop told me the rack will barely slide out the passenger side without taking the diff out but I have no clue how you would remove the lines. I want to change my bushings but thats alot of work since my racks new… toyota would not install my bushings sine it was warranty work…. Angry face!!

 

I just posted in the Tundra Crew Facebook page last night and quite a few people have done it themselves. One guy in Ocala, FL found Sumter Tire and they did it for $300 labor with rack in the truck like this tutorial. Below is a link to Energy Suspensions youtube video of them doing it and they made it way harder by not using a ratchet strap to move and hold the rack forward. Another guy said he didn't even have to disconnect the intermediate steering shaft from the rack to do his. The concensus is it's not hard, but hard work.

Here is the video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2hNkvMiHbNY&t=0s

 

Alright guys... I tackled the bushing replacement job but I dropped the front differential to remove the rack from the vehicle. I documented the whole thing on my gopro because there isn't one video I can find on youtube showing this job step by step. This video can be used if you're replacing your steering rack as well because the process is the same. Here is the link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uvZyCfiFCzI

 

For all that have replaced the rubber bushing with the Energy Suspension Poly bushings, did it effect the ride quality at all? I hear that poly bushings make the ride feel rougher and that they are squeaky. Has this been yall's experince?

 

They make the steering feel sharper and more controlled. I saw zero negative side affects.

Are you just asking about the steering rack? This thread is only about rack bushings.

 

Yes, I was talking about the rack bushings. Thanks for the feedback.

 

I haven't had any good experience with PU bushings on my other vehicles. They may be OK in Florida climate, but none survived just one New England winter, which are in general very mild. Some actually separated from the steel sleeve, because PU shrinks a lot in cold.

When time comes, I'll spend extra time finding rubber bushings for replacement.

 

Did mine recently(video of process in above post) and I can tell no difference in feel but my rack definitely doesn't move now. I'm just glad to have the noise gone when coming to a stop.

 

Post if you find an alternative to the PU bushings because I wasn't able to find anything and Toyota calls for just replacing the whole rack. Per toyota those bushings are not supposed to be removed and replaced.

 

PU bushings definitely squeak for suspension components but these are only lateral moving for the most part and I didn't notice anything.
Like Retro mentioned, the rack doesn't move like it did before. My stock bushings didn't look "that" bad when I removed them(I figured they were completely shot) but the movement now is maybe 1/4 of what it used to be. You can 100% feel a difference, especially at low speed.

 

Probably doing this soon but I'll just replace with a new rack while I'm at it.

 

Thanks to everyone for the feedback. My rack is moving like a sumbitch and I feel all sorts of slop / popping in the steering. I ordered the coach builder bushing and will make the swap soon.

 

Great thread, thanks everyone. I ended up here from the Steering rack thread which I notice are some of the same people here.

We have 2012 Tundra 5.7 4x4 with about 180k street. After having a worn tie-rod replaced it developed a knock/clunk when turned past about 75% of its sweep. Its a single pop that happens mostly in slower maneuvering situations like a parking lot. We can't pin point it to one side or the other, but it does seem like its coming from the front end. We have a sloped driveway that flattens out at the top, when we back up it and then turn onto the flat part while backing; this will 100% reproduce the clunk, just one clunk, as we turn.

It seems to drive good otherwise, I don't notice any slop or wobble. We had it aligned and that one tie rod replace and nothing else was mentioned. Aside from the clunk, I cannot find any worn parts, cannot recreate it by pushing/pulling on the wheels while suspended or prying on parts like ball joints or control arm ends... and have had it in to Les Schwab who said they also could not find any bad suspension parts such as control arms or tie-rods and suspect its related to the rack.

Does the clunk I've described lead to any specific conditions such as a bad rack vs bad bushings, or other that this group knows of?

 

i havevn't yet with 37s and 210k miles but it seems like it would tighten up the steering quite a bit. these trucks handle the bigger tires better than 4runners and tacomas in my experience.

 

An update to an old thread, I just did this a couple weekends ago. It was really not that bad. I used all hand tools, a block of wood, straps and jack stands. I didn't have to disconnect any lines or anything like that, marked steering so it went right back to where I had it. I had the whole thing torn down and ready to go in a 3 hours, took about 2 hours to swap the bushings out, then another hour to put it all back together and clean up. Someone younger and more agile than me would likely do it faster, but I have been wrenching most of my life and it was all very straight forward. Figured I would share my experience for anyone else looking at these threads trying to decide if they should tackle it or not.

Brent

 

That sounds 100% like what mine started as when my steering rack bushings wore out.

 

I’ve been putting this job off for a while, but my steering is getting so sloppy I’m going to have to address it soon. I have the BDS kit with the crappy bracket design, so I’m not exactly eager to get into it.

I bought a new OEM rack from the dealer thinking I’d just go ahead and replace the whole thing since the truck has 145k, lifted around 100k. I know the early 2nd gen’s are known for blowing racks, I’d hate to switch out the bushings in the old rack just to have it give out in the next year or two. So I’m also trying to decide for certain about that before I start tearing into it.

It sounds like a couple guys with the BDS kit have been able to work around the bolts being blocked by the bracket; is the only solution to cut the bolt head or the crossmember?

 

Just grind the BDS bracket enough to clear the bolts - I cut one of the flange "shoulders" flat on the bolts so they would come straight down. It's not that bad.

 

The problem with that is if you are on a lift with bigger tires, the problem will come right back. It isn't the rack design, its the crap bushing design. I highly recommend you put the ES bushings in the new rack before you install it.

Brent

 

100000% second this. If you're going to the trouble to pull the rack it would be foolish not to upgrade the bushings.

 

Yeah, definitely. Whether I put the new rack in, or re-use the old, I’m switching out the OEM bushings with the ES urethane bushings. I’d rather save the new rack for later when I actually need it.

 

Here's how I did mine. You can see you don't really need to grind "that" much of the bracket. Plus the BDS powdercoat is so garbage when you hit it with some spray paint it's an improvement.

 

Oh you barely even touch the bracket, I see. The flanged bolt could probably be replaced with a bolt/washer combo for easier servicing in the future.

thanks for providing that photo

 

You definitely have to grind it down since the bolt has to come straight down (due to the thickness of the rack and bushing sleeve) but it wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be.

 

So I started on this project Saturday, and as of today (Tuesday) the truck is still in the driveway on jack stands. Mostly because I ended up needing some parts/hardware that I didn’t foresee needing.

But the old bushings are out, and the new pressed into the rack. I did it without dropping the diff, or removing the rack.

As previously mentioned, various pickle forks and ratchet straps are essential to this job. I also used an air hammer too, a $40 craftsman with a few Mayhew bits from Amazon is money well spent if you don’t have one already.

Two of the old bushings are oval shaped. Not sure if there supposed to look like that, or if they’ve been beat into that shape. I’m sure it can’t be good for steering response, regardless.


For me, the rack bolts absolutely would not break loose. Cheater bars, 1200ft lb impact, and an air hammer with a chisel would not budge it; it ended up rounding the bolt head so that’s one of the replacement parts I’m waiting for. I had much better luck getting the nuts above broken loose, although I had to get creative and put a chain around the open end of a wrench and play tug of war to get it started. On the passenger side I pulled off that hardline that runs around the nut.


not relevant to this thread, but I also pulled the LCA’s and switched to SuperPro urethane bushings. Can’t wait to see how this thing handles when it’s all done.

(New OEM LCA bushing vs SuperPro)