Radius Ball Service

S

Steve Rinaldo

Member
I have just finished doing a service on my 1930. One of the things I did was to tighten up the two radius ball nuts. I checked a lot of the books and previous post about the proper procedure and found a bunch of ways to do it.. The reason for this was I had a slight steering wheel shake between 50-55 mph. I tightened the nuts until they hit the sleeve and then backed them off until I could insert the cotter pin. I drove the car and the shake was gone. My question, is the procedure that I used the normal one that is used?
Thanks, Steve
 
1931 flamingo said:
If it worked I wouldn't worry about it...............
Paul in CT
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Until it cracks/breaks the bottom of the clutch housing case. :eek:

There is a lot that is assumed in this area. If the radius rod ball is worn out of the 1.500" diameter, tightening seems the prudent thing to do however the fall grows in diameter as the radius rod is rotated. Overtightening allows the radius rod ball to potentially bind during the front-end travel arc. Hit a drastic bump with the cap overtightened and I have seen it where the housing was crack damaged.
 
midgetracer said:
If the rubber ball is such a poor fix, how come Ford used in the later models?
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Because in the thirties they had real rubber which lasted much longer when soaked in oil.

All I know is that the ones I tried in the 60's turned to mush in short order.

And all of the restoration shops that I worked at refused to install the rubber ball ... too many "comebacks" don't ya know?
 
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The offshore people who made the rubber balls in the 60s 70s and 80s were most likely using the same rubber that they later used to make the inner tubes of 10 -15 years ago and some of us know how that turned out!
 
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