Hi all,

Well I mentioned in my thread about injectors that it was finally time to re seal my vac pump because it had started really leaking. Seems I was wrong about the source of these new, and very sudden large puddles. Its PS fluid, and I can't figure out why, or where its coming from. Heres whats happened lately. Flushed PS fluid a couple months ago. Next, flushed fluid again to replace hydrobooster. At this point I was leaving drips, not puddles, from all the residual PS fluid all over the place from the two flushes. Next, I washed the underside of the truck to make sure I wasn't having major oil leaks. I went about a week seeing only a drip or two and sometimes nothing on the ground. All of a sudden I have large, very wet spots on the ground after sitting just a few hours. I thought it was the vac pump finally letting loose, but today I noticed that the fluid looked really light in color for engine oil. I got under to look and everything is a mess of course, but I can tell it is definitely my nice clean ps fluid, mixed with a little oil. The strangest thing is, everything is SOAKED, and even having not run the truck since yesterday afternoon, its still dripping every few minutes! There is literally fluid laying on the asphalt that hasn't soaked in yet, thats how fast its still leaking. Other weird thing is, the reservoir isn't really low  Where could this fluid be coming from? It definitely does not seem to be coming from any of the lines on the back of the PS pump. However, there are drips hanging off the bottom seam of the PS pump, it looks wet in between the PS pump and vac pump, but that could be oil. There is also PS fluid all over the top of the gear box which wasn't leaking much, if at all before. I do have a new return line from the gear box to the PS pump though, but even if that new line were loose(no i didnt check yet)  that couldn't be the cause, because how would fluid get up and back to the bottom of the PS pump? Could the PS pump be leaking from where the shaft that drives it comes out? Is it re sealable or does it need to be replaced? I'm planning to go to the carwash later and spray it off and then watch for leaks, but any thoughts in the meantime? I have my vac pump reseal kit on the way and Id like to tackle that next weekend. Just trying to figure out if i should be ordering a new PS pump for the same time....

Thanks in advance for any and all help!

So far looking good. I'd say the pitting in that shaft is no problem it not in the seal area. So it should be fine.

 

As for some of those internal pics can you imagine someone swapping a new power pump on and having that stuff flow through the new pump. Ugh...

 

As for the pin as long as it holds to the valve collar it should be fine.

Thanks for the encouraging words! Yes I was cringing for my new hydrobooster when I saw all that gunk! My fluid was good and clean so I dont think that stuff was floating around, but I'm planning to blow the hydrobooster and the lines out before putting things back together, just incase.

 

As far as the pin goes, the pin itself seems tight. It moved in quite a bit when I hit it with the punch, but it doesnt seem to move at all when I try to pull it back out. Its just that now the collar pops off of it very easily, but I'm guessing it is held on by the other part of the valve once its assembled. The pin is sticking out just how it is in the pics above, those were taken after I hit it with the punch. 

 

Mike, will you be available later to walk me through setting the bearing preload and the pitman arm adjustment once I get this thing back together? I looked through the FSM and they are talking about measureing torque at different degrees and all kinds of stuff I'm not familiar with lol. I'm assuming its pretty easy once its explained....lI'm not sure what your sundays are normally like, so if youd rather wait till tomorrow or tuesday of course thats fine...

 

Below are just a few more places with more wear than I liked, but I guess they reuse this stuff when the rebuild them anyway....

I tried to knock those off a little with a file. Didn't work too good though, its pretty hard!

 

1 hour ago, leathermaneod said:

I'm not sure what your sundays are normally like, so if youd rather wait till tomorrow or tuesday of course thats fine...

Go ahead and give me a shout I'll help you out. My Sunday has been more of house cleaning and shop cleaning most of the morning. Then haul up the mountain and clean the silt away from the dam wall intake. Like a rain forest up there grass and ferns are like 4 foot tall and really super humid near the creek. So now I'm just hiding in the house out of the heat (95*F).

 

The teeth on the piston that's from excessive slop and the teeth banging back and forth. I kind of figured that the file wouldn't do much being all the parts inside the gear box are harden steel.

Well everyone I goofed up and ruined the teflon seal for the piston. I was on the phone with Mike, trying to figure out how to get the piston to slide into the bore. He told me I needed a ring compressor or some scrap sheet metal and a zip tie. But I didn't have either and I made the mistake of just trying to pursuade it with a hammer and a block of wood and it shaved the seal right off. I had already split the o ring on the inner valve collar earlier and had to re use the old one. So I had to give up and go with a reman after all. Really pisses me off that I couldn't do something that should have been this easy. Especially after getting that far and seeing how simple it really is, for the most part anyway. I hope this doesn't discourage anyone else from tackling this, just have a ring compressor handy! 

Btw incase anyone was interested in the other stuff, I ordered a new bearing for my steering stabilizer off ebay for $23. I ordered rubber oem sway bar bushings from autozone for $15 each. I may end up ordering synergy ones off amazon though, still not sure. And I will be blowing out my hydrobooster and lines before installing all these new components after seeing all that gunk in the steering box. 

well I just ordered these off ebay. https://www.genosgarage.com/product/energy-suspension-55159g/sway-bar-frame-bushings

I've seen them listed at least two different places as being for 1500's, but obviously Geno's sells them and they are the right bar size....and they are cheaper than the oe replacement from autozone. Any reason they wont work?? 

I was cheering you on the whole way...

 

When you told me you destroyed the seal I was... (D'Oh!)

I know and I really appreciate all the time you put into helping me with this project. I should have just stopped and listened to you and figured out something to compress that seal. I guess I just thought if other people get it without one I should be able to as well. I dont know if the O rings in my kit were exceptionally thick or what. Oh well, live and learn I guess. I got it put all back together minus some of the seals I hadn't installed yet. Figured I'd save them just incase I need them someday. Then I went and got a reman gearbox. So now I just need the steering stabilizer bearing and sway bar bushing to show up, and some hardware from dodge, and ill be able to put everything back together. Check out the tag that came on my reman pump

That whole problem stems from oversized tires. The bigger and wider the tires on the front axle the more and more stress is placed on the steering gear box. Hence the reason I back down from 265's to 235's in tire size. Now look at my track record now. Only 1 trackbar, 1 set of upper and lower ball joints, still running OEM tie rod ends and steering gear box is not leaking and also OEM as well. I do not have any braces or addons for the front suspension. I travel lots of back country dirt roads and tow heavy on them too. So why is it that I'm at 264k miles and virtually no steering or suspension problems? Make you think...

Edited July 4, 20168 yr by Mopar1973Man

Sorry to hear you didn't get to finalize the rebuild, so much time and effort.  On the other hand you got to see the inner working of the steering box first hand and you gained that much more knowledge.

I went from 265 to 245 and haven't noticed any difference other than the speedos off a bit and need to recalibrate it.

10 hours ago, IBMobile said:

I went from 265 to 245 and haven't noticed any difference other than the speedos off a bit and need to recalibrate it.

 

Drop to 235's and the speedo will be really close to right. There is only 1 rev/mile difference on 235's vs 265's.

Is the the because of the 235(first number) or the second number? 235 is the width of the tread face, and the second number is the height of the tire by percentage of the tread face. For example, 235/75 is 235mm wide tread face and the height is 176.25mm or 75% of 235mm(from rim to tread face). Please correct me if I'm wrong here guys. So, stock 265/75/16 are 31.6" diameter, and 10.4" wide, 638 revs per mile. 245/75/16 are 30.5" diameter and 9.6" wide, 662 revs per mile. Then a 235/75/16 are 29.9" diameter and 9.3" wide, 675 revs per mile. To get a 235 to the same diameter you need to go 235/85/16 which is 31.7" diameter and 9.3 wide, 636 revs per mile. You can do almost the same with a 245, just need 245/80/16 which is 31.4" diameter and 9.6 wide, 642 revs per mile.

 

EDIT: I was just looking back at the tire site and I overlooked the fact that there are no tires available in 245/80/16. I wonder why that is?

 

On another note, anyone know if there is anything special to putting the steering brace on? I watched a guy on youtube do it and he mentioned tightening the bolts on the steering brace and the ones on the bearing carrier in a certain order so as not to put a preload on the bearing? Does that sound right? Does it matter? 

Edited July 4, 20168 yr by leathermaneod

Tire numbers are right. Hence why stock tires on the 1 ton was 235/85 R16 and the 3/4 ton was 265/75 R16.

 

On the steering brace I would thing it more about equal torque valves more than order of tightening. It's not like a head where clamping force is sealing a head gasket. It's more about getting equal torque on the fasteners so the brace doesn't move.

Ok sounds good. I just looked and the torque for those bolts (sway bar bushing retainer bolts which also hold the steering brace) is 40 ft lbs. I'm also going to pick up some new bolts for that (8.8 minimum) and some lock washers. I want that thing to stay good and tight. I think I'm also going to use red loctite on all this stuff. Especially since the pitman arm nut wasnt tight. 

 

By the way, any tips for getting the whole steering system full of fluid again since the gearbox, pump, lines and booster will all be totally empty? I know about the initial run procedure and I follow it each time I have had the system apart. I just wasnt sure if there is anything else I can do to ease the process?

Just had a couple more random questions about some things I noticed while poking around under the hood today. Should I be concerned about this?

It looks like the end of a wire covered with something rubbery like insulation but it feels more like just a random rubbery thing. At first I was concerned that it was something melted in the wiring harness but now I don't know...I don't wanna mess with it if I don't need to but It just concerned me. I don't know if the wires are glued together in there and thats just some excess rubber oozed out or what? Maybe the glue like is in some heat shrink tubing. I also don't know why there is a gap in the loom there. Maybe its because the crappy tape stuff is unraveling. I'm planning to just add in a piece of loom to cover that unless someone thinks there is a problem I need to investigate...I just get concerned when I see abnormalities in wiring harness's. Any input guys? Anyone thats had one of these wiring harness's apart before know what that is or if it is melted?

 

This next pic I'm just curious what it could be for?

Its just hanging out not plugged into anything by the back of the driver side headlight.

8 hours ago, leathermaneod said:

Ok sounds good. I just looked and the torque for those bolts (sway bar bushing retainer bolts which also hold the steering brace) is 40 ft lbs. I'm also going to pick up some new bolts for that (8.8 minimum) and some lock washers. I want that thing to stay good and tight. I think I'm also going to use red loctite on all this stuff. Especially since the pitman arm nut wasnt tight. 

 

By the way, any tips for getting the whole steering system full of fluid again since the gearbox, pump, lines and booster will all be totally empty? I know about the initial run procedure and I follow it each time I have had the system apart. I just wasnt sure if there is anything else I can do to ease the process?

 

No specific order for those bolts is needed. Just torque. I can find my hard copy instructions if you'd like.

 

Hard to tell what's in that wire loom but as long as bare wire isn't exposed I'd just be putting some new convoluted tubing over it with some electrical tape and call it a day. 

 

I've got the same plug as well. That is vacuum controller cruise control. Both our trucks are fly by wire cruise control.

Oh ok thanks! I don't like not knowing what things are, especially when they are unplugged. @notlimah if you have instructions for the steering brace install I wouldn't mind seeing them....thanks!

Heres another question guys,

So due to this steering upgrade, I've been reading the FSM on the clock spring and re centering and all kinds of crazyness that I hope I don't ever have to mess with. Anyway, it got me thinking, what do I do if the gearbox, intermediate shaft, and steering column don't all line up when I go to put them back together? I strapped the steering wheel in place, but what if the new gearbox isn't in the same place as the old one was with the wheels straight? or will it be from the factory? Just trying to figure this stuff out ahead of time so I don't have issues during the assembly.

 

One other random question, do you guys think the sway bar bushing/steering brace bolts should be 8.8 or 10.9? the ones that were in it were 8.8, but I wanted to pick up some new ones just incase. The guy at Fastenal told me to use 8.8 not 10.9 because the 8.8 will bend where the 10.9 will shear off....he said they are stronger, but also more brittle....What do you guys think?

Edited July 5, 20168 yr by leathermaneod

Subjected to enough force an 8.8 will shear also, I've done it.  A 10.9 bolt will be about 23% stronger.

 

https://www.boltdepot.com/fastener-information/materials-and-grades/bolt-grade-chart.aspx 

6 hours ago, Mopar1973Man said:

 

I've got the same plug as well. That is vacuum controller cruise control. Both our trucks are fly by wire cruise control.

 

Is there any other way to tell if you have fly by wire cruise?

 

@leathermaneod I'll dig through my papers and find it for ya! 

Edited July 5, 20168 yr by notlimah

1 hour ago, IBMobile said:

Subjected to enough force an 8.8 will shear also, I've done it.  A 10.9 bolt will be about 23% stronger.

 

https://www.boltdepot.com/fastener-information/materials-and-grades/bolt-grade-chart.aspx 

So would you use the 8.8's like were in it before, or upgrade to 10.9's?