Help with splined yoke

1995 Toyota Tercel, universal joint (sliding, splined yoke) between steering column and rack/pinion gearbox.

Want to upgrade to power steering on this car. Removed existing (manual) rack/pinion assembly and am trying to install the power steering rack/pinion. On the power steering unit the male splined shaft is a larger diameter than the splined shaft on the manual steering unit.

Existing splined shaft approximately (its metric) 1/2 " diameter while the new splined shaft is approximately 9/16" diameter. Attached are two photos of the yoke. Dealer wants $128 for the correct yoke and tells me that I will also have to buy the steering column (slightly shorter) for a mere $

237. Donor car is already crushed and gone. The three auto dismantlers that I visited have the wrong part (after assuring me it was for the power steering version).

Tired of all the driving and need METAL advice.

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Note in photo 2 that the splined yoke has a clamp bolt. The bolt passes by a reduced portion of the shaft obviating it from dropping off.

Any clever ways to attach this yoke to a slightly larger splined shaft? My only thoughts are: 1) drill out (enlarge) the yoke and pin it to the larger shaft. 2) Remove the shaft from the gear box, turn it down on the lathe and try to cut metric splines. 3) Weld the stuff together 4) Give up

There must be better ideas. Is there such a thing as a "spline repair kit" similar to thread repair inserts?

All ideas appreciated.

Ivan Vegvary

Reply to
Ivan Vegvary
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Look in the Yellow Pages for a steering column company. In the Oakland, CA area is a guy who only does columns. Rebuilds them.

Reply to
Calif Bill

I certainly wouldn't try pinning it.

Keep looking for a use steering column or check with some after market shops for high performance items. The off road racing folks offer a lot of this stuff. I just bought one a month ago to replace the rubber coupler on my 94 Chevy PU. About $90.

Reply to
Tim

cut metric splines. 3) Weld the stuff together 4) Give

be very careful - there are many things that can fail on a car and you can work around them and not die or kill anyone else, but loss of steering is really bad. I think I would get the right parts for this one and not take any shortcuts.

Reply to
Bill Noble

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