Steering slack with stock setup?

[Form]

Hey guys, I've been noticing some slack in the steering assembly on my savy, even though the screws that hold the posts in place are screwed on tight.

I've put up a clip on YouTube to show what I mean: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82IXliARNb0

The "problem" is most visible at about 0:16 where I rotate the wheel by hand. In the clip I apply no force to the wheel at all, I just rotate it until there is some resistance. At the steering posts it moves only by about 1.5-2mm but at the wheels this translates to about 10 degrees of free movement. This also makes small trim adjustments pretty much impossible to see when the truck is not running.

Is this normal? What do you think causes this? Do you think the upgrade steering bearings would get rid of this slack?

 

[dockharris]

cant watch vid it says it is private.

 

[Form]

cant watch vid it says it is private.

Oh you're right, this is fixed. You can watch the vid now.

 

[wildchild27]

its the stock bell crank bushings i had that problem till i did the steering upgrade

 

[Form]

its the stock bell crank bushings i had that problem till i did the steering upgrade

That's nice, I'm going to get that ASAP; it's a very cheap upgrade, too. Thanks wildchild27!

 

[wildchild27]

no problem but make sure your radio box is seated all the way down on the steering posts as well. i forgot to menchin that lol.

 

[frddyj]

idk if it's my eye, but your steering posts seem to move a bit on the bottom, just double-check & make sure the screws are tight.

here is a link for bearings for the steering upgrade, save you a few bucks. great bearings too https://www.hpisavageforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10575

 

[AllanQ]

Let me know what you findout Form because I am very interested in this. I have all kinds of slop in my steering and suspension. I have slop in my RSC, steering linkage, looks like some in the wheel axles. I have replaced most of this stuff before with no improvement and I am going to replace most of this stuff again and shim the Poop out of the RSC.

 

[Form]

no problem but make sure your radio box is seated all the way down on the steering posts as well. i forgot to menchin that lol.

I'm pretty sure it is, but I'm going to double-check. Thanks for the advice!

idk if it's my eye, but your steering posts seem to move a bit on the bottom, just double-check & make sure the screws are tight.

here is a link for bearings for the steering upgrade, save you a few bucks. great bearings too https://www.hpisavageforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10575

Thanks for the link frddyj, but I already purchased the steering upgrade kit (I thought SMF did not ship to Canada, damn!). Next time I look for bearings I'm going to check there first for sure! The posts move onto the shaft inside, and the screws are pretty tight. I'm pretty sure the problem is the plastic steering bushings like you guys suggested.

Let me know what you findout Form because I am very interested in this. I have all kinds of slop in my steering and suspension. I have slop in my RSC, steering linkage, looks like some in the wheel axles. I have replaced most of this stuff before with no improvement and I am going to replace most of this stuff again and shim the Poop out of the RSC.

np Allan, I'll post back when I get my steering bearings.

 

[AllanQ]

Steering post bearings will improve the smoothness of your steering, but is not going to take out all that slopp.

 

[Form]

Steering post bearings will improve the smoothness of your steering, but is not going to take out all that slopp.

Hum... I'm going to investigate on that further then. I'll post back soon. Any other ideas are welcome!

 

[johnnypoopoopants]

mine has some slop too, but i think most of it is due to the play in the servo, i notice my servo arm wiggles a bit on the actual spline, well the whole spline moves a little. By the time that play gets all the way out to the wheels it seems like a significant amount of play.

 

[Form]

mine has some slop too, but i think most of it is due to the play in the servo, i notice my servo arm wiggles a bit on the actual spline, well the whole spline moves a little. By the time that play gets all the way out to the wheels it seems like a significant amount of play.

I'm gonna look into that when I get back home, but as I remember there is not much play at all in my servo (Hitec HS-5645MG), it seems very precise and stiff. In the video I posted you can see the play in the servo arms.

What I think the problem may be (based on nothing but what you see in the vid): the inside shaft of the servo arm may be a bit to small for the outer "tube" (or the tube too big for the inside shaft) which may lead to it being able to wiggle around. The upper and lower screws on the posts hold the inner shaft in place very tight (to my knowledge, after double-checking the screws), but the outer tube is free to move around it and if it's got some play I think that may be the problem. I hope the steering bearings will help with this; unlike the plastic bushings, bearings could make better contact with the inner shaft and outer tube without causing any friction, which I guess would reduce the play. I'll see when the bearings get here. In the meantime I'm going to disassemble the steering assembly and check if I can find another issue we didn't think about.

UPDATE:

I stripped the servo arm (the screw came loose and the servo chewed the threads in the plastic arm) and I installed a metal Hitec servo arm and it *seems* to have helped a bit with this issue. At least it seems more responsive to me. Maybe this is all in my head but I didn't look forward to a performance upgrade in this area and yet it did seem to help. Although there is still a lot of play, which I think is attributed to two things:

1- The problem I mentioned in this post. Bearings should be coming soon so I'll see if it helps for this issue.
2- The wheels themselves wiggle.

Regarding point 2 : do the wheels need to / could be shimmed? I'm thinking of putting a few shims between the CVD and the wheel knuckle bearing on the inner side of the truck to eliminate some slack. What do you think about that?