Ah yes, that part had caught my eye in the Haynes picture. It's time for a rack rebuild then, at least there's a good opportunity when I'm changing the gearbox. I think rack rebuilds have been covered around here somewhere, but I can't remember, does it need special tools, or is it DIYable?

I picked up a replacement gearbox on friday, I would have liked to repair the one I had, but when this one cost 100euro from the scrappy and came with 2 free wheels, it didn't make economic sense.

Joolz,
definitely DIYable for someone with your capabilities, although I bet you'll get sidetracked into upgrading one part or another.
The only special tool needed is one to remove & refit the pinion, although some of the replacement pinion sets nowadays have a pinion retaining nut with a hex head instead of Citroen's original 'peg in slot' arrangement.
( They only used those to tempt the unwary into attack mode with a hammer and chisel, I reckon... )

Oversized sliding bearings are also available if there's a lot of wear in the guide tube, btw.

ken

I feel a new how to Topic coming up here!!!

More like;
"Well here is an old blender unit and hydroelectric pump I 'borrowed' from work to convert my rack and pinion into a drive by wire power steering unit..."

Harley

Hey Joolz,

Any chance you could count the number of splines on the LNA/GSA output shaft?
I counted the GS, 21, I even have the written down the type of cut it is but misplaced it atm...

Thanks!

Harley

other thing to watch is some pattern pinions are too long, its like they were parted off the wrong side of the line on the lathe its the bottom of the plain part that sits in the bush.

You mean on this part, yeah? I'll be home in a couple of days, I'll look then no problem.



Sean you've lost me, is that about gearboxes or steering racks?

Harley do you still need me to count splines? Was it that part in the photo you were talking about?

An update on activity, I hesitate to call it progress. I butchered the built in regulator and soldered a wire onto the terminals, then refitted the 2cv regulator and connected the wires up. A bit untidy but I'll redo it when I'm happy it works.



It's now overcharging... But I know why, there's about 0.5v drop in the feed to the regulator, I need to check out the fuse box and the ignition switch sometime to see if I can find it.

This weekend in an attempt to have some sort of demister, I've fitted a very small computer fan. It's a massive 40mm diameter and 0.9watt. It was chosen purely on the basis that I had it in the shed and it was easy to fit. I was quite surprised that it actually creates a noticeable draught across the screen, so hopefully it may also have some demisting effect. In keeping with the duct tape spirit, it's mounted with only three screws because that's all I could find in the right size, and the power is via a bared wire stuffed under one of the spades in the fuse box.

You don't need to disable an internal regulator - if there's two, all that'll happen is the one set at the lower voltage will control the charging voltage - because the higher-set one will never "see" the voltage at which it starts to do something.

So if your internal reg is putting out 14.5v, and the external would limit to 14.7v, the external will just see 14.5v, shrug, and pass it straight through.

If the internal reg is putting out 14.7v, and the external limits to 14.5v, the external sees 14.7v and caps it down to 14.5v, just as if it was being passed an unregulated 17v.

Not that easy in this particular case I'm afraid. Firstly the internal reg was undercharging, it was capping the voltage at under 14v and would keep doing so as long as it was connected. Also because the alternator is self-exciting, the voltage seen by the internal regulator is directly from the alternators output. That feed needed interrupting in order for the external reg to have any effect