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1968 Corvette

Relay Rod Rebuild

Even though I am thinking about switching over to power steering, I decided to rebuild the non-power steering relay rod anyways. Overall, it was a very simple process. The first thing I had to do was remove the remaining two tie rods.

origional c3 corvette tie rod 1968 corvette tie rod

With the tie rods removed, I moved on to taking off the metal clasp by removing the two bolts shown below.

relay rod metal clasp 1968 corvette relay rod seal

Once the metal clasp and the rubber seal were removed, I took out the cotter pin on the very end.

relay rod cotter pin

From there, I thought the cap would just screw out easily, but for me that wasn't the case. Because of its age, the cap wouldn't budge so I used a torch to expand the metal.

relay rod cap removal

After the heat was applied, the cap unscrewed easily.

relay rod cap

With the cap removed, I was able to use the ball stud to push up on the upper ball stud seat to remove both the spring and seat.

relay rod spring corvette relay rod seat

Next, I removed the ball stud by moving it up and sliding it through the wider opening.

ball stud

With almost everything removed, I used a screw driver to pry out the last relay rod seat and spring.

lower spring

Make sure to remember which parts go on each side, I cleaned the internals and prepped the relay rod for paint.

restored corvette gas cap painted corvette gas cap

I ended up buying my rebuilt kit form Paragon Corvette for somewhere around $55.

relay rod kit

After making sure that the inside was clean of contaminates, I packed it full of grease and installed the lower spring and seat with grease spread along the parts before installation.

relay rod grease

Next, I greased and installed the new ball stud. I finished it off with the upper ball stud seat, spring and cap.

ball stud new assembled relay rod

Once the cap became inline with the holes on the sides, I installed the cotter pin, new seal, metal clap, and tightened the bolts.

relay rod kit

All in all, the relay didn't take much time and turned out very nicely.

old relay rod new relay rod

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