I installed a PSC Extreme kit on my TJ a little over a year ago. I installed the box and test drove it prior to installing the ram and I noticed that the steering was very tight and wouldn't return to center, I could go into a parking lot and turn my wheel and do circles over and over or after a turn I'd have to "help" it return to center. This resulted in a highway drive where I'm constantly correcting the wheel back and forth.
I'm on 3" of lift with 35 MTRs @ 25psi, my toe in is about 3/16” and my caster is 4.5*-5*. Running OTK steering with a WJ knuckle swap. I even pulled from my front drive shaft and adjusted my caster all the way up to 7* and it didn't help.
PSC ended up sending me another gear, same thing happened so they sent me a third gear, same thing. At this point they recommended I back off the preload adjustment for the gear by 1/4 of a turn. I did this and it helped a little but my wheel would still not return to center like it used to. At this point I decided to give up and drive it for a while to see if breaking the gear in would help at all. Over a year later, being tired of how it drives on the highway I decided to retackle this once and for all.
I started backing off the preload of the gear by 1/8 turns and test driving it. This definitely helped but the return to center is still not 100%. In total I'm about 3/4 of a full turn "loosened" from how the gear was sent to me. Highway driving is markedly improved.
I gave PSC a call yesterday and their tech said the preload has nothing to do with return to center and he blamed my "extremely high" lift and caster as the problems and said that the weight of the jeep isn’t enough to drive the tires back to their center point. I told him my alignment specs are good and gave him the background on everything. He also sent me their procedure on properly setting the preload with the gear on a bench, something I'll probably try next.
They are willing to look at the box if I ship it in but I fear after 3 tries that it will come back the same way. I’ve seen a few other threads like this online, are PSC boxes just tight? Should I not expect 100% return to center? I’m tempted to buy a reman box locally to see if it exhibits the same problems.
Any thoughts?
I'm on 3" of lift with 35 MTRs @ 25psi, my toe in is about 3/16” and my caster is 4.5*-5*. Running OTK steering with a WJ knuckle swap. I even pulled from my front drive shaft and adjusted my caster all the way up to 7* and it didn't help.
PSC ended up sending me another gear, same thing happened so they sent me a third gear, same thing. At this point they recommended I back off the preload adjustment for the gear by 1/4 of a turn. I did this and it helped a little but my wheel would still not return to center like it used to. At this point I decided to give up and drive it for a while to see if breaking the gear in would help at all. Over a year later, being tired of how it drives on the highway I decided to retackle this once and for all.
I started backing off the preload of the gear by 1/8 turns and test driving it. This definitely helped but the return to center is still not 100%. In total I'm about 3/4 of a full turn "loosened" from how the gear was sent to me. Highway driving is markedly improved.
I gave PSC a call yesterday and their tech said the preload has nothing to do with return to center and he blamed my "extremely high" lift and caster as the problems and said that the weight of the jeep isn’t enough to drive the tires back to their center point. I told him my alignment specs are good and gave him the background on everything. He also sent me their procedure on properly setting the preload with the gear on a bench, something I'll probably try next.
They are willing to look at the box if I ship it in but I fear after 3 tries that it will come back the same way. I’ve seen a few other threads like this online, are PSC boxes just tight? Should I not expect 100% return to center? I’m tempted to buy a reman box locally to see if it exhibits the same problems.
Any thoughts?