Steering wheel/shaft differences?

[jthesby]

Ok, so I decided to upgrade to a steering box/column out of a '59 for my '57. Other than having to do a couple small things it went rather well.  Until I tried to slide my old wheel on.
It turns out the steering wheel/shaft splines are different?! Has anyone ran into this? The original '57 shaft and wheel have 1 large spline top dead, and the rest all small, so that it can be clocked anyway. The '59 is small spline the entire circumference? What gives? My dilemma was made even worse when I tried to order a restored wheel for a '59, guy swears up and down it came out of a '59 Ranchero, but it had the same splines as my old '57.
Is it a power steering verse manual thing? Did my box not come out of a '59? Help?

[canadian_ranchero]

when i did my steering box swap i found the same problem.what i did to fix the problem is i got a small file that was the same as the splines on the shaft and filed the steering wheel to fit.one spine at a time

[hiball3985]

I had the same issue when I put in a 58 box, I just filed out the one large spline on the 57 wheel. If your wheel is a 59 as the guy claims it should have an extra hole for the horn contact and spring.

[jthesby]

I had the same issue when I put in a 58 box, I just filed out the one large spline on the 57 wheel. If your wheel is a 59 as the guy claims it should have an extra hole for the horn contact and spring.

Thats the other oddity, it does have a hole, but the insulating bushing doesn't fit, and it looks like it's all buggered up.

[jthesby]

Here's the one that came with my '59 steering column/box:


Here is the "restored" '59 wheel that I purchased, guy swears it came out of a '59 Ranchero, and that I'm wrong, and that I need to check my splines again.


These two wheels are the same diameter, while my '57 wheel is a hair smaller.

[hiball3985]

I wish I could help further but I really have no experience with the 59 wheel. The photo of your original 59 wheel looks correct to me, same spline as a 58. The restored wheel has the wide spline like a 57 wheel. So I'm a little confused too!

[jthesby]

I wish I could help further but I really have no experience with the 59 wheel. The photo of your original 59 wheel looks correct to me, same spline as a 58. The restored wheel has the wide spline like a 57 wheel. So I'm a little confused too!

Lol, well, I'm at least glad to confirm that I'm not entirely going insane!

[lalessi1]

I have a '59 wheel in my car with a '58 box, no problems (in my memory). Now that is a seriuous caveat!!!

[Jeff Norwell]

I had the same issue using a 57 wheel on my 58 column...asking Jay
s advice(and others here) I used a small jewellers file and made a cut on the flat spot you have shown.
20 minutes later the wheel was on.

[Jeff Norwell]

I had the same issue when I put in a 58 box, I just filed out the one large spline on the 57 wheel. If your wheel is a 59 as the guy claims it should have an extra hole for the horn contact and spring.

Whoops.Jim had already answered...sorry!