Welp, Brown Santa delivered the goods...
I find it telling that these come in a Ziploc bag... Almost like they're expecting you to get pissed after doing 1 side & you do the other side 6 months later when you're no longer disgusted by the process. In the mean time, they stay fresh.
Tis' just the beginning...
Just to preface the remainder of this post, Timmy did an absolutely outstanding walk through on this video. If you're going to do this job, watch this video at least twice.
https://youtu.be/kmaZNBp1gZM
Now, their method of simply unbolting the rack & pinion & supporting it w/ a block & floor jack did not work for me. Once unbolted, the rack did not have enough lateral movement to allow the driver side rear cam bolt to pass under the inner TRE like Tim shows in the video. This was the result
The middle mounting bracket on my 3rd gen has a side vertical support that wouldn't allow lateral movement of the rack.
This part was extremely frustrating & mildly defeating. I'm not sure that sub 2000 model 3rd gens have that vertical support. I'm not sure that they don't. Either way, there was no way to avoid rack removal in my case. Yayyyyy! Now I get to bleed the power steering after this. However, the bright side is that my rack bushings need to be replaced something fierce. Removal of the rack solidified this. This will hold up the process, but I'd rather put things back together full ass & not ½ ass. No comments necessary on the amount of caked oil on the undercarriage. It disgusts me. ½ moons & cam plugs are clearly leaking & will be replaced as soon as she's off jackstands. A good degreasing & pressure washing will be done as well. Yuck.
Once the rack was outta the way, I was off to the races on the drivers side. I got my A-arm in the vice & placed my bottle jack accordingly w/ pressure applied to the bushing. Aaaaaand my torch was outta gas.
Right or wrong, I went forward w/o heat. Bruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuhhhh. Those bushings shot out like a hot round of 338 Lapua.
Prior to their removal, I ran a flathead through the center hole. To say that there was a lot of play is a gross understatement.
The Whitelines press in very easily w/ a decent vice & a pair of channel locks. Just make sure you wait to put the inner sleeves in after you press in the bushings. The washers can be a little troublesome to get in, but the bushings are pliable so they can be tapped in w/ a brass hammer w/o too much trouble. I used a flathead to help w/ alignment so I could get the cams threaded through.
Now, I'm reusing my stock cams & bolts... They're in pretty good shape. However, I ordered some SPC replacements from Toytec. I simply don't feel that these are of sound quality. A plastic center sleeve? No thanks. These will be going back.
Maybe I'm wrong, but these just don't seem like they'd have a very long lifespan. The "instructions" show the cams being installed the opposite of what the stock cams would be.
Driver side is back together, but awaiting proper torquing. Hopefully I can knock out the passenger side this evening & I pray that rack doesn't make me drop multiple F bombs when I try to get that helical gear shaft lined up & back in place.
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