[criswellnk]

I have rebuilt 3 different 7 tooth colums for my cars, and have torn apart at least a dozen more. The scoring on the end of the shaft, is on every shaft that I have seen, while the lower bushing has always been smooth, with no signs of the same scoring. On the shaft, I do not believe this to be wear, rather done during manufacturing.

The problem that I had run into was that the lower bushing would leak where the mounting plate for the lower bushing was swaged onto the bushing. Over time the mounting plate had loosened somewhat and the fluid would leak past. My fix was to simply weld the plate to the lower bushing. A nice small bead, and no one is the wiser. This stopped my most frustrating steering leak.