Yes, get a wheel puller. I wish someone would have impressed this upon me when
I removed my steering wheel. I recently finished removing EVERYTHING from my
1950; it's down to a frame and wheels. Over the entire project, removing the
steering wheel was probably the most difficult step. Granted, I made it
infinitely more difficult than it should have been, but I still wish I would
have just purchased/borrowed/rented/etc. a wheel puller to start with. I
shouldn't tell anyone this, but at the risk of being laughed off the list,
here's what I did. After removing the nut from the steering column, I tried to
pull the wheel from the column. I'm a pretty strong guy and the seat and
everything was out, so how difficult could it be? Well, apparently I'm not as
strong as I thought because the wheel wouldn't budge. Next, being the frugal
(read that as stupid cheapskate), my next bright idea was to make a "wheel
puller." I found an old door hinge that had holes about the right distance
apart. I thought that I could put two bolts down through the holes in the hinge
into the threaded holes in the steering wheel and as I tightened the bolts, it
would pull the wheel up. In theory, it's not a bad plan. Too bad I wasn't
removing my steering wheel in theory. I didn't take into account what might
happen when the bolts reached the bottom of the tapped hole in the steering
wheel. What actually happens at this point is that the bolt snaps off in the
steering wheel. I suppose at this point that I could drill the bolt out and
then get a wheel puller, but there has to be an easier way, right. Now no
longer a cheapskate but still stupid, I go to the auto parts store and buy the
wheel puller that I should have purchased in the first place and a set of screw
extractors to remove the broken bolt. In case you're not familiar with screw
extractors, they are supposed to grab on to a broken bolt or screw because they
are counter threaded, but in reality, they are a cruel, cruel joke. I drilled a
small hole in the broken bolt and then tapped the smallest extractor into the
hole. When it was tight, I put a wrench on it and started to turn it. Of
course the screw extractor broke off in the hole that I just drilled in the bolt
that broke off in my steering wheel. Thinking that maybe it was my fault
because I didn't drill the hole deep enough, I drilled another deeper, longer
hole down through the broken bolt and a piece of a very hard screw extractor. I
tapped a bigger extractor into the new hole, put a wrench on it, and started to
turn it to work the broken bolt out of the hole. Even though I'm the only one
in the whole world who didn't know what was going to happen next, I'll tell you
anyway. The bigger screw extractor broke off in the hole in the bolt that had
broken off in my steering wheel. After calming down to the point where my
vocabulary returned from incoherent random words mainly consisting of four
letters, I decided that maybe it was time to try the wheel puller. I proceeded
to drill out the broken bolt, but this was now a problem because the the bolt
had already been mostly drilled out, and now I had to drill through a very hard
broken screw extractor. There was no way to get a hole started in the middle of
the screw extractor, so the new hole that I drilled was slightly off center from
the old hole. The next order of business was to thread the new hole that I just
drilled. It's worth mentioning that the metal in the steering wheel is very
hard, and I have a very inexpensive tap and die set (see cheapskate note
above). Of course my tap would not cut threads into the hole that I drilled.
After much effort and several different methods, I was able to get one of the
steering wheel puller bolts to hold in the new hole. The problem now was that
since the two holes were no longer lined up, after a few cranks on the steering
wheel puller, it would slip off the steering shaft. At this point I may not
have been thinking clearly, but I whipped out the reciprocating saw. As I'm
sure you've now come to expect, all I had was a wood-cutting blade. Now
encouraged that I finally have an idea that might work regardless of the cost, I
head off to WalMart to buy some metal-cutting blades. I came back to the
garage, fired up the saw, and cut through top of the steering shaft and most of
the steering column. I knew that I wouldn't be re-using the original steering
column, but somewhat regret that I destroyed it. After I got the steering wheel
off, it still had a small length of the steering shaft in it. I put it in a
vice and tapped on it with a hammer. Obviously it popped right out. The moral
of this long-winded story? Get a wheel puller. After my ordeal, someone told
me that I could have tried putting the nut back on the end of the steering shaft
and pulling on the wheel with all my might while someone else smacked the nut
with a rubber mallet. They said that sometimes the jolt is enough to loosen the
wheel while pressure is being applied. I guess I'll never know if this really
works. I almost hope that it doesn't, though.
Mark Mintmier
1950 3100 (down to the frame, but missing a steering column)
Eugene Powell wrote:
> Hi,
> Can anyone tell me if I have to use a puller to get my steering wheel off the
> column? My son and I are trying to get the truck ready for sand blasting.
>
> G. Powell
> 54 Chevy truck
> oletrucks is devoted to Chevy and GM trucks built between 1941 and 1959
oletrucks is devoted to Chevy and GM trucks built between 1941 and 1959
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