The cause of steering play

[Navaros911]

Guys,

I'm back at it, working on the suspension project, second weekend (after a 4 weekend break due to business travel)...

The steering rack has been rebuilt as I thought it had some play in it... but later (after doing the entire rack) I found that the source of the play is something else.

There is a little piece that attaches to the pinion (of the steering rack)... see the yellowish part in the first picture. The pinion has an axle with some teeth and this yellow part just slides over it, then it is secured with a nut. The play is between the pinion and the yellow part... too much room between the teeth.

Is it OK to tighten the nut to the point where there is no more play?
Are there other people experiencing this?
Anybody has a fix for this?

Thanks,
Michiel

[Navaros911]

OK, forgot the pictures... I just want to get back to working on the car

[TRE Cup]

that nut usually comes loose from the car suffering an impact on the suspension on either side< our experience. As it is a oblonged piece- meant to tighten one use only, i would recommend 1- get a new nut from the dealer 2- use blue loctite and torquing it to spec. This is the area in your steering where if it lets go, you are no longer the driver- the chassis and terrain is!
On my race car, i weld that sucker down!. granted- the rack cannot be rebuilt but for the time being decent used racks are certainly more plentiful than my butt

[911mot]

Yeah I've come across that before now with a brand new (read freshly reconditioned) steering rack. I applied some torque to nip up the free play and it's been great now for the last 3000 miles.
You dont need to remove the rack to do it - go through smugglers box. Fiddly but do-able.

[911mot]

TRE got me worried now..
Think I'll set the mig on it for saftey's sake