U-joint on steering shaft: float or bolt down?

Abodysrule said
OK, I have a data point. Luckily, my pot coupler was powder coated, so the wear pattern inside where the shoes rub was very easy to see/measure, all four tracks are 23 mm long. The edge of the shoe that rubs there is 21 mm long. 23 mm - 21 mm = 2 mm So, that means the flex my system was seeing at most 2mm up and down the steering axis (more likely 1 mm up and down from a central shoe position). No way those splines would pull out of the U-joint.

I'd be curious to see if anyone else has made this measurement and what the numbers look like.

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I can see the small hole in the coupler body where the small roll pin installs to keep the coupler from pulling apart. The early cars don't have that feature. But, it is also impossible for the coupler to pull apart in that fashion. I might could see the coupler sliding off the gear box, but it would have to have been either left loose, or not installed all the way or both.