and just to confirm with what jonnyrochester said above, i had to cut 6mm of my tie rods (Standard AE86) because they ran out of thread.
As for the lock spacer, mine catches, im about to pull it all appart again, measure the ID of the rack bush and put the spacer on a lathe and mill it down so its a perfect fit. and im going to put the verniers on the spacer to see if the thread is centered. ill get back tomorrow with the results