jdcude
07-04-2007, 07:02 PM
I had a lot of play in my steering since I bought the truck 2 years ago, and it was not getting any better (Never does). I bought a "Front end rebuild kit" on line to rebuild my front end. It cost $360.00, and came with a lot of stuff so it seemed to be a good deal. It came with the wrong idler arm, and since I was in the middle of the project I went to my local parts store to get the right one. $80.00 later I had the right one and proceeded with the job. The kit also did not contain the Pitman arm (The most defective part it turns out). Another trip to the parts store, $25.00 later I had the Pitman arm. Getting the old one off was a pain to say the least since I did not have a fork that was 1.25 inches wide, and there is no way to get a puller on without pulling the steering box. Now to the main point of this post... I wanted to share how I got it off in a minute. I used a 3 ft piece of 3/4 lead pipe fished it down the engine bay by the power steering pump to the top rear of the pitman and after a few good whacks with my 1 lb hammer it popped right off. I still have the ball joints and all the "Rubber" components to replace, But I did want to spend some of the Fourth with the family, more fun for the weekend.