Highboy power steering pole

[72hiboy4x4]

so I have a F-250, manual steering, that will never get lifted much higher than stock. I have a 2wd power box and all asst. hardware for the swap (as detailed on this site)
why are your parts, (and which ones- option #2?) tougher than what I can put on my truck? I will need heavy duty everything to run the tow truck as I plan.

not trying to criticize, just looking for information and ideas. I'm interested in anything that will turn the 33x12.50 tires I have on now!


BTW-did you get that late-model truck stripped yet? it looks like I will be in the area this weekend, stripping my F-600 down.

[averagef250]

I don't care for the 2wd or 78/79 box on a highboy. It was one of the first mods I did when I got my first Ford 4x4. I tore it off and went back to power assist. Alot of folks like the power assist, it's a pretty hot commodity for those who's truck came factory with it. I've rebuilt alot of the power assist setups and while they do work well, I see some room for improvement.

If you break both systems down side by side, the power assist versus the power box they both have advantages and disadvantages. The advantage of the power box is of coarse simplicity. The disadvantages are it doesn't fit without surgery and it's not very strong. The power assist is more complicated, it wears out and it's more expensive to buy parts over the counter, but it puts more turning force to the tires, it bolts in and everything works the way it's intended.

[67highboy]

I've been weighing my options about this for a while now.
I have a 67 with manual steering, a dana 60 kingpin axle up front from a 78 350.
at the present time I am running 40" ground hawgs (just switched from 38's).
I ended up buying a box from a 78/9 250 4x4 and made a plate to weld in and bolt it to. However I have been worried about this set up... I am afraid this set up wont have the intestinal fortitude to turn the hawgs while sitting still or at a crawl speed.

So... How about a ram assist kit with brackets to weld or bolt to a dana 60 front?

I personally would be interested in checking something like that out.



John

[averagef250]

Ford made a ton of them from the factory. The low pinion dana 60's ford used under thier crew 4x4's from 73-77 had power assist. Those axles and brackets are pretty common and will bolt power assist right to a 78-79 axle. You will need a tie rod for a 76-77 F-250 4x4 though.

If there was a demand for them, I could build the power assist bracketry.

No, the 78-79 box won't be very impressive with 40"s. How much suspension lift are you running with the stock manual box?

[averagef250]

Has anyone used an 83-85 straight axle Yota box?

[ICEMAN6166]

sounds like a good plan for those who wish to convert their highboys to power steering, i am not one of them but there is definitely a market for a good system.

the toyota 4x4 box is used by some 57-64 straight axle guys in their power steering conversions, i know its an 80s toy 4x4 box, not sure of the exact years.

[averagef250]

I've never seen the toyota box installed, but I sold a winch to a toyota 4x4 guy the other day and we got to BS'ing about the highboy steering and early straight axle toyota steering setups. He said one of his friends just put the 83 to 85 box on his F-250 4x4 for power steering. I was surprised that someone would use an import pickup part on a fullsize 4x4, but toyota has a pretty good rep for making little stuff that holds up. I'm curius if anyone has good things to say about this conversion.

For as much fuss as people make about the highboys lack of a really good PS system I'm surprised nobody's come up with one yet.

I like the way the power assist works and it was the factories best solution to putting power steering on these trucks. People are real quick to label thier leaky, sloppy power assist junk and scab a power box on when they may not realize the power box is a downgrade in several respects. There's a ton of buzz out there over adding hydraulic steering to the saginaw chevy box. Lots of people are jumping on the hydraulic assist bandwagon and it seams funny to me that highboy owners want rid of it. An interesting thing is how tapping a saginaw box for power assist is so redundant. The power box has a big piston inside, it's the same thing as a hydraulic cylinder, but it's all self contained. The problem is it's not very efficient at putting turning force to the tires. That big piston loses alot of it's leverage through the steering gears, the pitman arm and steering linkage deflecting and suspension movement. So the solution has become to stick a hydraulic cylinder right on the tie rod putting the force straight to the tires. Wow! Genius! Now us Ford guys already have the luxury of this hydraulic cylinder and without the redundancy of a power box.

[mljjones67]

How hard would it be to add the power assit to a manual steer 4x4? Also what parts would I need? Thanks

[averagef250]

You need the control valve, assist cylinder and hoses from a 73-77 F-250 4x4.

[ICEMAN6166]

i had a few highboys with the ram-style power assist and they gave me no problems.i rebuilt the ram on one and it was not too hard or expensive,it has been about 16 years so im sure there are a lot fewer used ones out there and the kits have gone up in price.

[ptodave]

I really like my 78 2wd box,enlarged one bolt to 5/8,changed pulley on PS pump to smaller one,ran direct to crankshaft ,dodge pitman arm,chevy draglink, my truck is 72 with 79 Dana 60 front. Turns 40 inch tires with detroit locker pretty good. Drives on street great. Been on truck about 20 years.

[averagef250]

I put 40K on my '70 in 3 years with a 2wd box. I took it off and scrapped it in favor of power assist. I rebuilt the box and switched to a saginaw pump before I pulled it off. No difference, steering sucked once I locked in the hubs. That was with 35"s and an open 60 front. A truck with power assist will make a mockery of a power box offroad. I'm not talking mud drags , just hauling firewood, driving on unmaintained forest service roads, using a heavy duty 4x4 in a manner it was built for without abusing it.

[67highboy]

Ford made a ton of them from the factory. The low pinion dana 60's ford used under thier crew 4x4's from 73-77 had power assist. Those axles and brackets are pretty common and will bolt power assist right to a 78-79 axle. You will need a tie rod for a 76-77 F-250 4x4 though.

If there was a demand for them, I could build the power assist bracketry.

No, the 78-79 box won't be very impressive with 40"s. How much suspension lift are you running with the stock manual box?

Thanks, that is very good to know about the bracketry fitting my HP 60. I didn't know it would interchange.

I am running custom 6" springs in front with a 4" riser block on the steering knuckle.

It drives as good as can be expected with bias ply Ground Hawgs. It tracks nice and straight, doesn't pull or wander too bad. It actually drives good for its size, you just cant turn it in tight trails, and if your trying to steer out of a rut.... FORGETABOUTIT!

so in summary if it is possible to adapt the torsional control from the newer box (because I hate those push pull directional valves) power assist is for me

John

[ptodave]

Seems like everyone down here in So.CA. is running PS box and adding the ram.just saw one done and you could turn 40 inch tires at dead stop. I just never liked the ram because it hangs to low and more stuff to go wrong.

[averagef250]

I may have an even simpler, less expensive way to get the torsion valve setup into a highboy. Instead of actually adapting the valve to the manual box which isn't very easy and requires the box be sent to me and the truck owner to shorten the steering shaft, I was thinking about making the torsion valve part of the steering shaft. The torsion valve can be packaged so that it's less than 2.5" diameter, altogether the valve is about 10" long, but the torsion rod itself can extend inside the steering shaft and the valve would only be about 2.5" diameter and 4.5" in length. 4 hoses would hook into it and the valve could just rotate freely on the steering shaft. There could easily be a bracket devised to keep the valve fixed to keep the hoses from melting on headers or flapping around. It probably would not be that hard to route the hoses with a couple clamps so that the valve didn't need anything to hold it in place.

The shaft mounted valve would be rediculously simple. There's nothing to it. Two bearings, two seals, an O-ring, a couple C-clips and the torsion valve inside.