First off......spare me the safety issue talk and just scroll on if that's what you have on your mind. I'm a decent welder and know how to burn in my welds.
But! If your like me and tired of dicking with the occurring (reoccurring with me) slack in the steering shaft of our trucks but don't want to pay the high dollar price.....or just have more time than money (me) then this is for you. I've purchased the inner guts of the factory coupler and have rebuilt it twice. Both times it's lasted a few years and then started making slack again. It's a zero deal and an aggravating one......taking up slack in a steering wheel,rocking it from bump to bump,driving like a drunk....it's not my idea of comfortable ride. So I wanted to fix it.....fix it without spending 200$
Looking around I found a link to this http://www.speedwaymotors.com/Speedway- ... ,6632.html on Facebook. I believe oldestof11 shared it and I was quick to save it to revisit when I had the time.
Ended up purchasing one off of eBay for 19$. A dollar saved is a dollar earned......same part.
Basically the hardest part of this is finding out just how long you need your shaft to be. What I did was to disassemble the turd factory coupler and knock the crosspin out of the shaft. Reinstalled the rag joint and shaft on the steering column yoke and installed the new coupler on the gear box. Holding the shaft over the new coupler,I marked the shaft where it would be almost flush inside the yoke of the coupler (the weld on side). I then cut the shaft,slid the coupler on and mocked up the assembly.
This is where I came to the realization that the factory shaft is turned down to around 1/2" from the 3/4" right where the weld on yoke will sit. Damn. Turns out it wasn't that big of a deal. I called O'Reilly's and found some cylinder head dowel pins that would shim the 1/2" shaft section out to the 3/4" yoke hole. So I tacked the dowel to the shaft,then mocked the whole thing back up. Tacked it,pulled it back out
Before I welded it up solid I removed the other yoke and joint. I didn't want to burn that little feller up
Finished production
One thing I will mention our gearbox spines look like this
The one on the left
The horizontal space is where I put the set screw in the outer yoke
Silver nut/black Allen screw
Keep in mind this will allow movement needed to remove the shaft in the future.