Whatchoo talkin 'bout Willis? The search I did on 96s came up with 89 complaints with a whole slew related to the clutch. The centerlink showed in 3 that I can remember - wait - yeah - those the new guy posted just above.

TYPE : VEHICLE
YEAR : 1996
MAKE : TOYOTA
MODEL : T100

Results : 89 | 1 - 15 Displayed

Mine's fine (96) as near as I can tell, perfect, actually, because it's no longer an operable piece of the truck - only thing is that it still has an idler arm stuck in it. It's 4xGeek's whenever I find a poster tube and reinforce it. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/drunk.gif" alt="" />

I always did think that there was an awful lot of leverage on that junk by the time you got to the steering stops. It's not all that thick, and it does seem that coatings are not Toyota's strong suit, so I can see where the rust would come in to play.

Yes, snapper go wipe a big booger of grease on them stops, but if that's your original Pitman arm, you may want to leave that to someone with an impact gun, a good torch and bombproof puller. Request (or put) a generous portion of antiseize on the new one, and watch for leakage around your steering box just after it's done. I doubt the Pitman is the noise you're hearing. Wear on it is negligible compared to the further out the linkage you go (idler, ball joints, tie rods). The Pitman arm is usually just thought of as being in one piece or in pieces.