I have a 1992 LX 5.0 with 120,000 miles on it. I need to replace the
outer tie rod ends as they have never been done before and I'm getting
a lot of steer play from them. On other cars that I had, whenever I
replaced the out tie rods, I would do the inners rods as well just to
have them done as a set. I have a Ford Service Manual for the car and
the procedure that they have outlined to replace the inner "tie rods"
has the rack and pinion set out of the car, and the replacement is done
on a bench. I've never worked on the inner rods of a R&P set, so, I'm
not quite sure how it is done. It looks like from the service manual
that there is a pin holding the inner rods in place, and then a special
tool is needed after that pin is removed to unscrew the inner rods. The
Haynes and Chiltons manuals that I have don't even address replacing
them, just the boot that covers the inner rods.

I did a search of the newsgroup and I see that on similar topics many
of you suggest replacing a high-mileage rack and pinion set and maybe
even the hoses and power steering pump instead of just replacing the
inner rods due to the fact that there is probably a great deal of wear
on all of the components, and the amount of work to replace the inner
rods alone just doesn't justify replacing them alone.

My main question is: How do you replace the inner rods while the R&P is
still in the car? Could I trouble someone to walk me through the
process? Are special tools needed? Any little tricks I should know
about? Any help would be greatly appreciated.