dbryan23
Junior Member
- Joined
- Mar 14, 2023
- Posts
- 10
- Reaction score
- 13
- Location
- Georgia
- First Name
- Donald
- Truck Year
- 1978
- Truck Model
- K10
- Engine Size
- 400 SBC
I know there are a million threads all over the internet about how to remove the steering arm on a square body (and maybe other GM trucks). Most of the advice consists of "beat it with the biggest hammer you own. Eventually the cone washers will pop out."
Well, I beat it from every angle with a sledge and those little bastards didn't move. I don't own a welder, so I couldn't try the second most popular advice of tacking the nut to the top of the washer and unscrewing it. I even tried the double nut trick and tried to unscrew the actual studs, but that didn't work either. So then I broke out the grinder and was going to try cutting the end of the steering arm off in order to at least free the last stud. I figured maybe if I could get that one loose, then I had a better shot with the other two. The whole point of this is to replace the stock steering arm with a raised one to accommodate my 4" lift, so I wasn't worried about destroying the old one.
But then a little lightning bolt struck me. I'm sure I'm not the first person to think of this, and the same advice is probably in some of the existing threads. I used the cut-off wheel to make indentions on each side of the washer... just deep enough so I could clamp some vice grips onto the washer itself. Then I carefully started wiggling the washer back and forth like I was trying to loosen an exhaust bolt without breaking it. I had soaked everything in Blaster the night before, so that probably helped. Sure enough, within a few seconds I was able to start unscrewing the washer a little at a time. By the time I turned it a full rotation it was pretty much completely loose and I unscrewed it all the way off the stud. Then I did the same thing to the one on the other end and it worked just as well. I figured with the two ends free, the middle should be pretty easy. I hit down on the steering arm about 5 times about halfway between the third stud and the drag link end, and the middle washer popped right up. I clamped the vice grips on and screwed it right off.
The thing with those washers is that they're not just held in by the pressure against the side of the hole in the steering arm. The threads of the stud actually dig into the inside of the washer and almost turn them into a threaded nut. So it's a whole hell of a lot easier to unscrew them than it is to just hope they pop up from swinging a sledge hammer for 2 hours. Some people say that only had to hit there's 10 or 15 times. So give that a try first. Maybe you'll get lucky. If not, just take some kind of grinder and clear off some material from the steering arm just on each side of each washer until you can grab them and unscrew them. A die grinder of heavy duty Dremel type tool would work better. I actually butchered one of my washers with the cut-off wheel so I had to order some more from ebay. If I had to do this over again, I believe I could have the steering arm off in less than 30 minutes without nearly ending up in the ER from swinging a sledge hammer.
Well, I beat it from every angle with a sledge and those little bastards didn't move. I don't own a welder, so I couldn't try the second most popular advice of tacking the nut to the top of the washer and unscrewing it. I even tried the double nut trick and tried to unscrew the actual studs, but that didn't work either. So then I broke out the grinder and was going to try cutting the end of the steering arm off in order to at least free the last stud. I figured maybe if I could get that one loose, then I had a better shot with the other two. The whole point of this is to replace the stock steering arm with a raised one to accommodate my 4" lift, so I wasn't worried about destroying the old one.
But then a little lightning bolt struck me. I'm sure I'm not the first person to think of this, and the same advice is probably in some of the existing threads. I used the cut-off wheel to make indentions on each side of the washer... just deep enough so I could clamp some vice grips onto the washer itself. Then I carefully started wiggling the washer back and forth like I was trying to loosen an exhaust bolt without breaking it. I had soaked everything in Blaster the night before, so that probably helped. Sure enough, within a few seconds I was able to start unscrewing the washer a little at a time. By the time I turned it a full rotation it was pretty much completely loose and I unscrewed it all the way off the stud. Then I did the same thing to the one on the other end and it worked just as well. I figured with the two ends free, the middle should be pretty easy. I hit down on the steering arm about 5 times about halfway between the third stud and the drag link end, and the middle washer popped right up. I clamped the vice grips on and screwed it right off.
The thing with those washers is that they're not just held in by the pressure against the side of the hole in the steering arm. The threads of the stud actually dig into the inside of the washer and almost turn them into a threaded nut. So it's a whole hell of a lot easier to unscrew them than it is to just hope they pop up from swinging a sledge hammer for 2 hours. Some people say that only had to hit there's 10 or 15 times. So give that a try first. Maybe you'll get lucky. If not, just take some kind of grinder and clear off some material from the steering arm just on each side of each washer until you can grab them and unscrew them. A die grinder of heavy duty Dremel type tool would work better. I actually butchered one of my washers with the cut-off wheel so I had to order some more from ebay. If I had to do this over again, I believe I could have the steering arm off in less than 30 minutes without nearly ending up in the ER from swinging a sledge hammer.
