I have an 86 F150 standard cab 4x4 farm truck with 197,000 on it. I was servicing it the other day when I happened to notice that the tie rod ends and the connecting bar had way too much play in them. The tie rod end on the drivers side was missing the bottom cap with the grease zerk and had at least 3/4" of play on the up and down motion. I've grounded the truck until I can get it fixed. I'm going to try to save some money and do the repairs myself. I'm to the point where it may not be worth throwing any more money into it. Besides a Haynes or Chilton manual what would I need to get the problem solved. I am pretty mechanically enclined and have a pretty good shop to work on it.

I'm a newbie to this forum so let me know if there is a different protocol that I need to follow.

Thanks in advance.

 

I just measure and screw the new tie rods to roughly the same position then take the vehicle to get a proper alignment. Buy the best quality tie rods you can afford as I bought no-name ones once for an S-10 and within a year I got to change them again and I kept them well greased with synthetic grease.