TORQUETALK
Sometimes it pays to listen and act on your own advice. I always suggest to customers that a good steering guard is required for off-road, and given recent events with people bending and breaking track rods, fitting heavy duty steering arms can save a lot of grief in the bush. A lot of the time people ignore this advice, usually due to cost.
In recent months there have been several instances where people have bent or broken track rods-off road causing problems getting home. I only bent mine last year, but since then two people have come looking for replacement steering arms after physically snapping or breaking their track rod. One on a Defender, the other a Discovery. Bending the track rod is common, but snapping it in two certainly doesn’t happen often, that I have seen.
After sorting out my own bent track rod issues last year, I thought about fitting a steering guard to the Discovery but never did, putting it off until another day!
On the recent Off limits Operation Stirling at Waiouru, I rued that decision to delay fitting the steering guard. Heading right out the back I took on a steep hill climb just to challenge myself, having done it several years ago. These days the army engineers have a nice metaled track that winds up around the hill, but I tried going straight up as we used to do.
The track was rather slippery from the rain so I was in the tussock beside the track. Driving in the tussock has advantages for traction but also there can be lots of dangers hiding amongst them. In this case I was progressing nicely until I came to an abrupt halt, hitting a large tussock bush that was washed out around its base causing a good sized mound capable of stopping the vehicle.
Backing down I checked underneath for damage and yes, the steering arm from the steering box down to the wheel hub was rather bent. Not normally a problem but it does limit the ability to turn in one direction. I continued on with no obvious problems until later. That was when I was in some ruts and attempted to climb out.
The wheel jammed against the rut and the hydraulic forces from the power steering pump was enough to completely bend the steering arm to the point I was unable to steer left; only straight ahead and right.
Bush mechanics were required which involved using the winch through a pulley block back onto the steering arm, then with the vehicle’s jack under the arm to stop it dropping down and turning, the winch was slowly used to straighten the arm. It took a couple of resets on the winch and jack but we got enough of the bend out to drive slowly back to the camp at Waiouru where further options would be investigated.
Ideally it needed to be replaced for the drive home, but late on a Sunday afternoon there aren’t many options to source a replacement. The next best thing was to remove it and straighten it somehow; normally using a hydraulic press, but again there was a lack of one of those handy.
As a stroke of luck a current serving army workshop mechanic, George Alexander, was at the workshops changing his wheels before driving home after the event and allowed us the use of a bench and vice in the workshop. Fortunately the Army bolts everything down well, including the workbenches to the floor.
With the steering arm removed from the vehicle it was clamped into the vice and with the assistance of an additional person we pulled on the arm and without any real effort it was straight again. Actually I was impressed in how straight we managed to get it just by hand but the pipe was now weakened, soft and would easily bend again off road, especially in ruts. It was however good enough to drive on the road back home.
Back home the search was on amongst the parts stock for a second hand steering arm to fit, but the cupboard was seemingly bare of good second hand ones. There was a set of new heavy duty Terrafirma steering arms in stock so the steering arm has now been replaced with new which included new ball joints. I haven’t fitted the track rod for now as that would have upset the wheel alignment that was done recently.
By the time you read this I will also have fitted the heavy duty steering guard which will probably need some modifications to fit with the ARB bull bar. It also has recovery eyes included giving more options for front recovery points.
So in the future will I take my own advice? I hope so as it does save a lot of time and grief in the long term.