I was taking my column apart yesterday and couldn't get the ignition switch out. Pushed in the retainer, but it just wouldn't slide out. I fought with it for an hour and then took it to my friend's shop for him to look at. He had to fight with it too, ultimately yanking it out with a lag bolt and slide hammer (with the tab depressed). Everything in this car is seized to the thing next to it!
So the good news is he eventually got it apart. The bad news is that when I left it with him, to be "helpful", he completely disassembled the column without pictures or notes, so now I have a bag of parts. I have lots of photos of the stuff I did, which only gets me to the ignition switch.
Has anyone seen a good reference for assembling a column from scratch?
The Canadian 1969 shop manual has an exploded diagram on page 9-18 which is the best I've found yet. But there are SEVENTY-ONE (71) parts in that diagram, no order, and its tiny..
-- Edited by davepl on Thursday 22nd of March 2018 10:54:40 AM
Maybe Howmac in Winnipeg will chime in. He indicated to me the 4 speed floor shift columns are slightly different than the automatic floor shift columns. I don't know what the difference is.
-- Edited by seventy2plus2 on Thursday 22nd of March 2018 08:29:36 PM
The four speed column still has the steering lock mechanism off the Muncie's linkage so it's very much like an automatic column inside, I guess.
I'm in the "blast, clean, and paint all the pieces" stage right now, so when I get to reassembly if I get stuck I'll post a status pic of where I'm at!
There's a little plastic ring goes on the very end of the steering shaft called a "Shaft Stop Ring", and mine is nearly gone. Any idea where I could find that? I doubt it's a commonly serviced item!