Steering wheel upside down?

M

Mr. Blues

Member
don't ask me how but...
old family car (1971 Skylark) steering wheel is mounted upside down.
(the "V" is pointed DOWN). Can the steering wheel just be pulled and reversed OR does one have to do something with the steering box as I have been told?
That seems kind of strange.
Just flip the wheel with a puller right? Thanks for all replies.
 
Just pull it, and flip it to correct the visual appearance, it shouldn't have any effect on the steering, if there are no existing problems. :thumbsup:
 
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Turn the steering wheel all the way left, note what position it is in, and count how many turns it takes to get all the way to the other position. Go back half way to find center. Then look to where your front tires are pointed. If they are aligned straight ahead and the wheel is still "upside down", you're good to go for turning it over. But if the the front tires are not pointing straight ahead, your pittman arm is off a tooth on the steering gearbox. I had this on a '64 car that tended to pull right and float. You need to make sure that the gear box is at the middle of its travel due to the crown on the sector gear, which reduces backlash when driving straight down the road.
 
Hmmm...thanks for your reply....
I think I understand about the steering box etc. in relation
to wheels pointing straight/alignment but what does this have to do with
flipping the steering wheel 180 degrees so the "V" (center) is pointed UP
(^) and not down. Can't I just flip the steering wheel to where it should be
with some kind of steering wheel puller tool?
 
It may be that everything isn't in order, and I'm just pointing you to easy checks. In the end, if the things I mentioned are true, you'll end up pulling the wheel twice (not that big a deal), and I always drill to the bottom when I do something to avoid getting bit by weird problems. YMMV
 
Several years ago I bought an old Sunbeam roadster. When turning to the left it would climb its own tail but when turning to the right it took about a half acre to make a U turn. I disconnected both tie rod ends and found the straight ahead position as directed above. Turns out one tie rod end needed to be lengthened about 2 inches while the other had to be shortened the same amount. When finished the steering was correct except that the steering wheel was about 30 degrees off center. I took off the wheel and repositioned it to the correct straight ahead position. Some moron had incorrectly set up the front end starting with the tie rod ends. See the sequence and why?
 
I noticed this old post while looking for help with my steering column. You never mentioned the type of column or if you fixed it.
I remembered it last night when I caused the same problem for myself while reassembling my '70 tilt column. I had to replace the actuator rack so while I had the column disassembled I cleaned and greased everything including the upper shaft and centering sphere. Much to my dismay I had forgotten to confirm the orientation of the upper shaft so when I got to installing the turn signal canceling cam and lock plate(the lock plate is keyed to the shaft) I realized it was 180 degrees out and if I continued the only way to mount the wheel would be upside down! AAARRRRGGH.
Anyway tear down and reassembly were much faster the second time as it was all fresh in my memory.
 
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It was intimidating at first. If/when you do it I recommend you have the shop manual for your year/model. There are also several easy to find step by step examples on line. Read everything first to make sure you understand the parts and any special tools such as steering wheel puller, lock plate compressor and pivot pin puller(for tilt column). None of the tools cost over $10.00.
It took me two days (mostly buying tools and parts) to get to the point that I realized I had screwed up but only about ten/fifteen minutes to take it all back apart and put it back together correctly.
 
Rattus said:
Turn the steering wheel all the way left, note what position it is in, and count how many turns it takes to get all the way to the other position. Go back half way to find center. Then look to where your front tires are pointed. If they are aligned straight ahead and the wheel is still "upside down", you're good to go for turning it over. But if the the front tires are not pointing straight ahead, your pittman arm is off a tooth on the steering gearbox. I had this on a '64 car that tended to pull right and float. You need to make sure that the gear box is at the middle of its travel due to the crown on the sector gear, which reduces backlash when driving straight down the road.
Click to expand...


Great to share this mate, I've encountered the same thing when I noticed my front tires not pointing straight ahead. It turned out that the pittman arm was indeed off a tooth on the steering gearbox.
 
Turns out one tie rod end needed to be lengthened about 2 inches while the other had to be shortened the same amount. When finished the steering was correct except that the steering wheel was about 30 degrees off center. I took off the wheel and repositioned it to the correct straight ahead position. :hurray:
 
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