Gearbox Pitman Arm
 

Is there any marks on the pitman arm ? I have rebuild my gearbox and didn't make any marks on the arm.There is one mark on the shaft, but nothing on the arm. Does it make big difference if it will be little off? Thank you. Car is 1990 300E

On my W126 gearbox there were marks on both the shaft and the arm. You should always make your own marks if there aren't any there. I don't think being off by 1 or 2 splines will make a huge difference, but beyond that I think you could run into issues as it will make the lock-to-lock distances different from left to right. You should do a search here as you will probably need to center the gearbox and then center the steering wheel before reassembly.

There are alignment marks on the shaft and on the arm. There is also a bolt next to the shaft used for alignment. It takes a 'special tool' which is nothing more than a longer bolt with a point on the end. I picked up a longer bolt at Lowes or Home Depot and just screwed it in locking the internals.

Here's a link to a steering box overhaul page.

http://www.davidpetryk.net/Mercedes/Steering.htm

I'm going to attack the box on my 420SEL which is leaking badly.

The centering tool and tecnique should always be used when working with steering box/componets. It is there to assure lock/lock , steering centralization , SW and directional cancel cam slot position.
It is alway used for front end alignment , but you will find very few places that even know it is there. You will never see a cocked SW after toe alignment if they use it in for chassis set-up measures.

Thanks all for your replys.I have put my box back, filled it up with steering fluid, started my car and let it work for the couple of minutes.It started to leak from the pitman arm shaft cover, so I dropped it back, pulled 4 bolts from the cover and removed it.Here is why it leaked, and I have no idea how this could happened.I guess I will need new box.:mad:

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I'm glad you found the problem.

Wow - how in the world did that happen? It looks like some binding may have occurred?