SteeringColumnYourBuddy

[gehl@domain.elided]

A bit of a debris field here ... Yes, I do enjoy a occasional nap in 
my Scout bed, diagonally it is perfect (no rear seat), lid off, sun 
warming into the 60s ... 
... rebuilt my steering column yesterday just for fun (don't drive 
the thing, but the steering is damn smooth) ... I always have the 
problem of compressing the spring and cinching the lower clamp bolt 
by myself.  A thought, can I do this out of the vehicle ... put the 
steering wheel end on the floor, clamp her up ... but then, will the 
column fit through the bulkhead gaiter??? ... and how far do I clamp, 
as hard as I can or midway in the spring compression???
... amd what about the plastic compressive bits in the shaft.
With time these bits have slipped a bit (at least the plastic in the 
aluminium mounting blocks.  They still seem firm, so I reused them.  
... have removed the turn signal switch and horn circuitry (never 
worked anyway) ... quite clean in there without... figure it will 
take three wires poking through a dash hole to sort this out (+12v 
feed from flasher bimetal, port side lamps, starboard side lamps) 
... and for emergency flash, twist all three together.
Can life really be this simple?  

I would remove the spring in the steering column, first I got to 
figure why it is there.  Anybody know?
Mark