Steering u joint and DOT

[NIDE9]

He All. First off I hope I am posting this in the correct place. Second, I Love my New to me Mack!  I had a Dot inspection done at a local shop today. All went well except the tech said I needed to replace Drag link needs replaced and a few small exhaust leaks. He also said I had too Much play in my slip joint on the steering column. All these things were marked and need repaired for DOT. My Question is Regarding the slip joint. There is movement in the shaft due to the length it has to span to reach the u joints closer to the gear box. Is there supposed to be some sort of support for this shaft inside of the fire wall. I have a rubber boot on the outside of firewall only. Does this make sense? The truck is a 1989 superliner with an e9. I am going to replace the u joints, but Not Sure about this slip joint. Any help would be Great.  BTW the shop has a good reputation, but the Guy doing the inspection was a bit younger than My truck.

[h67st]

The shaft doesn't have any support except for the u-joints...it has to be able to move around when the cab/frame flexes. If the slip joint has any slop it will have to be rebuilt or replaced (twisting slop, not in-and-out).

[fjh]

in my opinion if the shaft has no loss of motion twisting it  it is fine!how ever it is the inspector you have to please not me!

[NIDE9]

There is no twisting slop at all. I am going to put new u joints on it and sign it off. There is a very small amount of play in the drag link. Mack wants 500.00 for one. Yikes  I cant find after market for it either. 

 

[IH Farms 2]

On 2/9/2018 at 4:38 PM, NIDE9 said:

There is no twisting slop at all. I am going to put new u joints on it and sign it off. There is a very small amount of play in the drag link. Mack wants 500.00 for one. Yikes  I cant find after market for it either. 

 

Try pai industries 

[Rob]

There is a grease zerk on the slip to lube both it and the mating spline. Get a grease fitting and knock the center out of it at the bench. Temporarily replace the original fitting with the one missing the guts, (check valve). Collapse the steering column fully, and pump fibrous wheel bearing grease into the area till it starts to ooze out. Replace the grease fitting back with the original and call it good. Fibrous grease is a lot "stiffer" than most NGLI-2 chassis lubrication greases. That grease zerk is right about your knees when driving so you don't want it oozing back out of your temporary fitting onto your clothing as it kinda pisses off the person doing the wash.