Manual steering and carb questions

Hey, I have a couple questions and figured it would be easier to ask them in one place. So first,

I changed my tie rod ends and that tightened my steering up a little bit, but my truck is still all over the place with like 30° of play. The rest of the play is in the gearbox. Is there any way to tighten up the box itself or is it just a whole new one?


Second,

I have a 2 barrel mikuni on the 2.6 motor and no matter how much I lean it or richen it, it runs exactly the same. I've tried turning every screw on the thing and it still runs the same. That wouldnt be an issue if it wasnt running a little too rich to pass smog.


So TIA! 😁

I still have the mikuni carb on my truck it was running bad so i cleaned the egr and plugged off some exhaust return line and it runs and idles a bit better and takes the gas easier...but depending on where ya from you might need the smog junk