The steering wheel doesn't have to come off to replace the steering box.

The steering box has a centering lock that should be used when doing work on the steering system. I'm not sure how you clock the pitman arm relative to the locked steering box, but I'm sure you can get a lot closer than 7-1 just by eyeballing it or using scribe marks. I'm even more sure it's in the manual that a good tech would know by heart and a reasonable tech would know to reference.

Sixto
95 S420
87 300SDL