‘66 Steering Column Issue - NOT the common cause

[birdissues]

Hi everyone,
I hope an expert can help me with this one. I just bought the T-bird, and I’ve been tearing my hair out with this one. I have a ‘66 t-bird that has ~1/4” play between the column shifter housing and the hub that holds the detent. The play is in the direction where if I grab the shifter housing I can pull it up towards me 1/4”. It causes it to pop out of park unless the column is slid to the side. The parts that are new: shifter lever, shifter lever bushing, shifter bushing roll pin, lower bushing, upper bearing and retainer, and rag joint rubber. The owner before did the work. I have confirmed all the parts were new and replaced - even removed the lower bushing to inspect and then reinstalled it. It was brand new.
Any ideas?
I have a video I can text or email to demonstrate the play. Please help.
Thanks to anyone that has ideas!

 

[birdissues]

Well after hours of fiddling with it, I finally figured it out. The previous owner had tightened the two bolts that connect the shifter hub to the hub that has the detent, but did not have the square heads in the slots in the outer steering column. It was not fully assembled. The square headed bolts are shown in the picture on the upper right and lower left. Happy o figured this one out! I hope this helps someone in the future.

 

[tbird]

Thanks for the update in case someone in the future is searching for a similar issue!