I am in the process of replacing the steering knuckles on my wife's 55 3600. We took everything off, cleaned it up, got new bushings and a new kingpin set, got the bushings reamed properly, everything looks great. Slipped the kingpin in and it presses in tightly and nicely, no worries until I come to the thrust washers. The 3/4 tons didn't have thrust bearings, so I'm left with those bronze washers.
Here's the problem: I took off the washers and found that the opening on the thrust washers is too narrow by what I would surmise (by eye) is about 1/32 to 1/16" diameter. Thus, here's my question:
Do the bronze/steel combo thrust washers have to be reamed to fit, or do you set them there and then press the kingpin through?
I would assume that pressing the kingpin through would damage it, but I don't know how these old systems work and don't want to mess this up and have been unable to find anything on the internet.
To make matters worse, I am under a lot of time pressure, since I have to get this moved this weekend and I need the wheels on to do so.. Our landlord is getting foreclosed on and we have to move. Any help or insight would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!
