Kyle

WHY WON'T IT GO INNNNN!?

Regretting my life right now, lol. I removed the steering rack during my TTS supercharger install to give it a full refresh while also having more clearance in the bay. I also had to shave down the ear closest to the crank pulley for additional clearance to the supercharger pulley stacked onto the crank pulley, so to do a more precise job of it without shavings going all over the bay, I removed the rack entirely.

While removing the steering rack I was having a hell of a time getting the rack out with the torque sensor still attached.....Per the shop manual removing the sensor wasn't necessary to slide the rack out of the car on the passenger side, but I was having trouble finding the correct orientation to get it slid out, and didn't want to beat up my engine bay knocking it all around. So I figured removing the 2 bolts and yanking out the sensor wouldn't be a big deal.....

Until now....This damn thing does not want to go back in under any circumstance, lol. The rack is now back in the car, and has obviously been manipulated around a bit with the sensor removed, so I could imagine it changed things around enough to make this a difficult process as far as the internal helical gears wanting to mesh again.


I've read plenty of threads, and it seems no one has mentioned having any difficulty re-inserting this thing.....When I try putting it in it's like it's hitting a brick wall where it should be slotting in. I've tried rotating the shaft around (while maintaining the correct orientation via the shop manual) and it just won't go in. I must have spent a straight collective hour fiddling with this damn thing. And yes, before anyone mentions, I tried snugging up a floor jack to the driver's side inner tie rod per Billman's recommendation...still nothing.

My last ditch effort is loosening the rack guide lock nut & bolt. It makes no mention of the need to do this in the service manual, but I've seen it mentioned several times that people have loosened this nut while replacing the torque sensor and said it was necessary....so I currently have the Honda tool being overnighted to me.....Really don't wanna have to play with the settings of the guide bolt, but I'm out of ideas....

Did anyone else have any difficulty getting this thing to go back in? I know removing of the torque sensor/rack isn't the most common work performed on these cars, so the experience on it will be limited...I just couldn't imagine me being the only one having a difficult time getting this thing to slot back in...

Billman250

Read carefully.

Put a jack under the driver’s side tie tod, close to the inner boot, and put some pressure on it. Dont jack the crap out of it, just put some upward pressure on it.

It will compress the friction spring and the TS will go right in.

Kyle

I tried that....Didn't want to go in. Perhaps I need to go closer to the boot? I was roughly in the middle of the tie rod, and wasn't putting a ton of pressure on it....I'll try it again today.

Kyle

Just wanted to update this thread for anyone else that may potentially have this issue in the future.

IT'S IN.

The problem was pretty rudimentary and almost embarassing. I had removed the torque sensor while the rack was still loose in the car just to ease the removal process. Well, without that sensor meshed in, the steering shaft inside of the rack is able to rotate freely. While fumbling around with trying to remove the inner tie rod ends (I should've removed them while they were still in the car....) I had managed to completely flip the shaft upside-down.

Luckily I had the wherewithal to shine a light up there yesterday to investigate, because the sensor didn't have any sort of engagement feeling whatsoever when trying to insert it...This is what I saw:




As you can see it was just a bare shaft...Without the cut splines there it was completely blocking the helical input shaft of the torque sensor from going in. Here it is after rotating the shaft 180 degrees.....Not perfectly lined up in this pic, but it gives you an idea. MUCH better...





Just wanted to share my issue in case this potentially arises again....Now I have a tool on the way that I no longer need as I was going to try loosening the rack guide; that wouldn't have worked either. I'm sure my case was a very special one, but it COULD happen again, so I figured it would be best to document this in case someone else has the same trouble as me in the future.

And thank you @Billman250 , even with the rack shaft in the correct orientation I still had trouble getting the sensor in; the jack under the driver's inner tie rod worked a treat; went right in with ease, just like you said it would! I never doubted ya for a second, but I don't think anyone could've accounted for my stupidity with the shaft being upside-down