The last thing I want to do is deal with a steering column. I hit a pot hole and now all of the sudden, my steering wheel is extremley loose. It won't pull off, and it seems to steer fine, though I am sure its probibly unsafe. You can grab it and litterally wobble it like a bobble head doll. Is there a bearing in there that blew? What could of happened?

 

May have bent/damaged something in your steering linkage, knocked it out of alignment, or both.

 

I'm new here but......there are two bearings on the column.One lower (hard to get to) and one upper (fairly easy to get to). So I saw this post and probably a good place to ask: I'm working on my girlfriends 1996 F250 and know the upper bearing is F4DZ-3517-A but I'll be damned if I can locate the ring that goes into that bearing to keep it tight. I've come across various "names" including thrust ring, retaining ring, etc. and have found a bunch of mis-applied part numbers for the wrong piece. It's not the part that holds the bottom of the spring in place or the snap ring. And all the images lack an actual part number other than "part 6 or part 7,etc". Any help out there???


It's the part in the middle bottom.

 

Have you tried a few Ford dealership parts depts?

They usually have a complete parts breakdown for any model Ford available . Professional shops don't look to buy anything on line because they need it yesterday.

 

yep, that's on my list for tomorrow. 30 miles to town. Thanx.

 

I find it hard to believe the steering column could get damaged by hitting a pothole. Does the steering wheel wobble when sitting still or when the car is in motion?