New Project for Posi

With a little inspiration from johneyboy03 I started a new project. I sent my Saginaw box off to Redneck Ram in Texas for a rebuild and porting for a ram assist. Just got this back yesterday. Their turnaround time was 12 work days. That's 12 days from the day I shipped it! Wish me luck.

 

Hey , that looks Industrial.........did they want to turn the pump pressure up?

 

They suggest that I try it with the stock pressure first, but they have a tech article that details how to increase the pressure and the flow if necessary. Looks to be pretty simple. The PSC pump I'm using is supposed to be able to put out fairly high pressure as is. My biggest challenge on this is making a bracket to mount the ram to the axle. The tabs they provided may work, but I have about 6" of space between the axle tube and the tierod. I just put the steering box back in today along with the steering column. I replaced the lower bearing in the column and it was easier with the column out. I need to get the Jeep out of the garage so I have more room to work on the steering. My garage is about the size of a shoebox. I already installed a cooler for the power steering fluid last summer.
The cooler really is in there straight, just looks crooked.

 

nice!!

About the pump, i'm running the stock one and i work fine since 2 years now.

Keep on the work i'll folow this post for sure

 

Wow... That looks serious..

 

Will it be street legal or is the Jeep trail use only?

 

Ram assit are fully legal, full hydro set-up aren't.

For my experience, ram assist beat any steering absorber, it give you a great road handling feeling, and on the trail you wont ever feel loose of power steering

 

Very little street use. From what I understand though, full hydro steering is not street legal, but hydro assist is legal as you still retain the "factory" steering box.

 

Hydro assist used to be offered on old Ford pick up truck.

The red neck ram set up nice, and a few folks around here have used them successfully / without issue.

 

So I started mocking things up today. Paid for my wife to go play golf so I could have some quality garage time. Started by hooking a chain hoist between the rear of the Jeep and the rear bumper on my truck and hauling the Jeep out of the garage so I have more room to work on it. I can't start it because the power steering system is dry and I don't want to put any fluid in it until I'm done. I was able to use one set of the weld on tabs they provided with the kit but I had to fabricate one for the ram to axle housing mount. I used 1/4" plate and was able to get the ram to align with the tierod. It's definitely tight with the narrow track D30. Here's the bracket I made. It is about 2 3/4" longer than the one that came with the kit.



Here's what it looks like with tie wire holding everything together. the end of the ram that connects to the axle tube is about where it goes, but the other end of the ram is only approximate for the moment.



I have an opportunity to run the Rubicon next weekend if I can get this together in time. I talked to my welder today about welding these tabs on for me as I don't trust my welding for anything related to steering. I should be able to get the tabs tacked in place tomorrow and get them finish welded on Monday. If I get to go, we are going to run the Rubicon backwards from Tahoe to Loon Lake. That will be a first for me. In a typical winter this would not be possible, but this may be the silver lining to the drought cloud.

 

Looks Good Bud!

 

Voila' Ran short of PS fluid so I won't be able to finish bleeding out the system until late tomorrow. I'm using Redline synthetic fluid per the kit supplier's recommendation. They didn't spec Redline, just that whatever I use make it synthetic. Naturally the local NAPA didn't have any synthetic so it's coming from Summit Racing.






If all goes well I'll be driving the Rubicon Sat and Sunday. The trail is currently closed on the Loon Lake end because of excess water on the trail, so we plan to go in from Tahoe and camp at Buck Island on Sat. Cold but fun. We have 9 rigs going.

 

Looks Real Nice.......Good luck on the trip.

 

Those are really nice steering components. Did you make the tie rods out of DOM yourself or did you buy them?

The hydraulic cylinder you installed uses the P/S gear as a valve to operate it? So, they drilled and tapped into the gear on either pressure side and use that to power the ram? Does that lower the effectiveness of the original P/S gear? Did you install a higher flow or higher pressure P/S pump?

 

The cylinder work with the flow direction on the ps box. The pressure will goes into one or other hoze depending wich direction you turn the wheel. It wont lower the effectiveness of the original P/S gear, you will gain force where normaly you're loosing it.[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]
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[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]As ps pump, a saginaw just like him, is perfect even if oem. If he would have change to a close ratio ps gear it would be better to upgrade the pump but he ran a normal one so no need of it.[/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]You did someting good, you will like it for sure i promess. Have a good trail a rubicon [/FONT]

 

I made the tie rod and drag link from 1 1/2" .250 wall DOM with weld in inserts. The pump is from PSC and I drilled out the pressure fitting slightly to increase the flow rate. It is possible to increase the pressure output of the pump, but Redneck Ram (actually West Texas Off Road) says it's probably not necessary with the ram. They have a tech article on their website that shows how to do it.

johneyboy03: Thanks for your help with this. I am anxious to try it on the trail.

 

All modern tractors use this type of steering, minus the steering gear. I have seen the bungs that you wend into the DOM in speedway or jegs or summit. Looks pretty easy to do. Have fun.

 

Great work as usual John.

Have fun on the Rubicon, hopefully the ice on Big sluice is gone. I saw a video from around Christmas and it looked wild.

 

Two of the guys that are going on this trip went through from Loon a couple of weeks ago. Looks like we'll have 9 rigs, so we'll have plenty of manpower. Weather Service is calling for a slight chance of snow for our trip back out on Sunday though. Low around 27 for Sat. night. It won't be the coldest night I've spent out there though.

 

I got a chance to drive the Jeep today and I think my Jeep has a new super power. I can steer it with my little finger. Of course trail time will tell all, but I think it is going to be gobs better, especially with the front locker on. Hope to take some pics of the run this weekend. Slight chance of snow on Sunday for the drive out, but with a dozen or more people we should have no real issues that can't be resolved. Film at 11.