I seem to be suffering from the dreaded affliction of steering rack accelerated decrepitude. My rack is sloppy already and it seems like it's been less than 2 years since I installed my last one. Since I seem to be chewing up steering racks at an accelerated rate, I wanted to get a better understanding for the common failure mode so I might better understand approaches that might be helpful in reducing my rack consumption rate. First a description of the issue/symptoms: as usual for when the steering rack gets sloppy, the symptom is excessive play in the steering action. This play results in the car getting squirly when driving on rutted roads, and handling generally gets sloppy and lacks the precision handling that makes the DMC such a nice handling car. Initial troubleshooting revealed no surprises. The slop is due to the inner tie rod end (usual). When the wheel is turned, the inner tie rod end initially translates vertically until some slack is taken up before it translates horizontally. Now to my questions on understanding the rack failure modes: where the inner tie rod end enters the rack, is there a centering bushing through which the tie rod end passes? Is the slop that gets manifest as excessive vertical translation of the inner tie rod a result of the centering bushing getting elongated? If there is no such centering bushing (I guess I could just remove the boot and look for myself), what are the rack failure/wear modes that result in the observed kinds of slop (especially the vertical translation behavior). If there is a centering bushing, it seems that it would be pretty easy to improve its durabiltiy by turning a delron bushing (or name your favorite bushing material). Knut