steering play

[Ramairgod84]

So yesterday I bought a 91 firebird. I noticed one thing that i wanted to fix right off the bat. The steering wheel has ALOT of play. i can almost turn the wheel a quarter to where it'll start to turn. What could this be? a friend of mine told me its something called a "rag gear" that attatches down between the rack and pinion and the steering column. ?

[Cutlass]

he is talking about a rag joint. Its the rubber flexible joint between the steering gear and intermediate steering shaft. Here a picture of one below. I'm not sure if your firebird has one but it might. Otherwise there are lots of sources of steering play on these cars. I don't think they have rack and pinion so you looseness could be inner or outer tie rods, idler or pitman arms, or the steering gear itself(which should have some adjustment to tighten it up a bit.)

[gnomee]

I had to replace this on our 96 T/A

Its amazing how much better the car steers!