Honda Giken Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha

Nihon Plast Co., Ltd.

Kenji Nemoto

Kuninobu Uchida

Nagatoshi Murata

Iwao Maruyama

Keiichiro Gunji

Kunio Nokajima

Mitsuo Kaneko

Toshio Stou

Takehiro Minagawa

Masao Miyata

A method of assembling a steering assembly having a socket connected to a steering shaft via a steering joint which socket is to be serration-fitted to an input shaft of a gearbox which is mounted on a suspension assembly. The phase of the socket is measured at the time when a steering wheel is aligned in a neutral posture while the steering assembly is maintained in the same articulated condition as when the steering assembly is assembled to a car body and while the steering wheel is serration-fitted to the steering shaft of the steering assembly. The phase of the input shaft is adjusted such that the input shaft can be serration-fitted into the socket in the phase measured in the preceding step. The adjustment is performed by rotating the input shaft within an angular range corresponding to one half pitch of the serrations of the input shaft in either direction from a neutral posture in which the steering angles to the right and to the left are equal. The alignment of the right and the left wheels is adjusted to a condition where the car can run straight while the input shaft is maintained in the adjusted phase. A guide member which determines the phase of the socket relative to the input shaft is engaged with the input shaft in such a phase relationship that the socket becomes substantially equal in phase to the measured phase when the input shaft is in the adjusted phase. The socket of the steering assembly is serration-fitted to the input shaft of the suspension assembly by guiding the socket with the guide member.

Method of serration-fitting assembling steering assembly

The boss of a steering wheel is serrated by setting the steering wheel on a serrating broaching machine, inserting a serrating broach into a through hole defined in the boss of the steering wheel, and then pulling the serrating broach with a broach chuck gripping the serrating broach to cut serrations on an inner surface of the through hole in the boss. The steering wheel is positioned nonrotatably in a prescribed angular orientation on the broaching machine while placing the boss on a holder of the broaching machine. Then, the serrating broach is inserted through the through hole in the boss into the holder of the broaching machine while holding the serrating broach in a prescribed angular orientation around the axis thereof with respect to the broach chuck. Finally, the serrating broach is pulled from the boss with the broach chuck gripping the serrating broach to cut serrations on the inner surface of the boss.

Method of and apparatus for serrating a steering wheel

Alignment adjustment apparatus for holding the subsidiary frame of a vehicle suspension sub-assembly and the suspension components in the same position they would assume when attached to and supporting a vehicle body includes sensors for detecting the relative position of wheel mounting members and knuckle arms thereby permitting alignment adjustment relative to previously measured locations of attaching means on a vehicle body to which the suspension sub-assembly is to be attached.

Process for adjusting alignment of a suspension sub-assembly

Growing community of inventors

Sayama, Japan

Kenji Nemoto