Steering Upgrade Ideas
- Thread starter AssBurns
- Start date
Many times. But you still need a ram to move the wheels back and forth, and that's the weak link.
Stairgod
Two bad decisions away from buying a bulldozer
- Joined
- Apr 22, 2019
- Messages
- 2,453
I read somewhere about someone contemplating it.
Get on it!
I'm most likely going full hydro, but I want to really look into the Saginaw/Swingset option further before I commit.
Maybe we can get @Plastics Guy to come up with a boot solution for you guys. If anyone can do it, it would be him.
Looks like a solid kit, but I'm still not convinced it is the best long term solution. Helps keep the rack from compressing and adds some rigidity but the rack still has the ability to take loads up/down which kills the seals and guides. The biggest benefit is the ability to add hydro assist to it.
Hmm... Thinking out loud here. Tell me if I'm retarded for this or not.. For someone that would want to retain a mechanical failsafe but add the benefits of hydraulic to the system.
What if you did something such as the rack saver but with a double ended full hydraulic ram. Then for the stock steering rack, you just cap the hydraulic lines so it's just a manual rack and pinon and all the hydraulics are done through the ram. That way you still have some sort of mechanical linkage as a failsafe, but the stock rack doesn't cause any issues with hydraulics needing to be synced. Because if you did some sort of hydraulic assist and the stock rack blows the seals, you'd lose all the fluid and won't have any power steering. If you keep the stock rack from being pressurized with fluid, then you don't have to necessarily worry about seals blowing out. Even if you do, it's separate from the ram.
Is that retarded or does that seem like something that could be worth looking further into?
What if you did something such as the rack saver but with a double ended full hydraulic ram. Then for the stock steering rack, you just cap the hydraulic lines so it's just a manual rack and pinon and all the hydraulics are done through the ram. That way you still have some sort of mechanical linkage as a failsafe, but the stock rack doesn't cause any issues with hydraulics needing to be synced. Because if you did some sort of hydraulic assist and the stock rack blows the seals, you'd lose all the fluid and won't have any power steering. If you keep the stock rack from being pressurized with fluid, then you don't have to necessarily worry about seals blowing out. Even if you do, it's separate from the ram.
Is that retarded or does that seem like something that could be worth looking further into?
Blender
Swiftie
should work.
Since the aux hydro cylinder is now your primary it should be inline with the tie rods imo. Somebody was talking about that in my assist thread. Stock rack would need to be moved rearwards. I don't have room for that, but maybe you're willing to cut more. Alternative is to have the aux cylinder behind the stock rack position, but you may just be bending the non-power stocker towards the front of the truck leading to a failure. All tradeoffs.
Yeah that makes sense. It would need to be a very rigid setup to ensure you aren't destroying the stock rack.
I don't see anything wrong with it, and I think with a little work you could probably use the control valves in the OEM rack to run the hydro-steer ram.
Flow rate and PSI might be an issue? But I'm not knowledgeable enough about how hydraulic steering valves work.
"Here's the formula: Volume of cylinder (ci)/ volume of metering valve (ci) = turns lock to lock
For example: a Howe 2.5-inch bore x 8-inch-long double-ended cylinder like the one we installed on our project Mega Titan has a cylinder volume of 25.82 cubic inches. The Mega Titan's metering valve has a volume of 7.6 cubic inches, if we do the math: 25.82/ 7.6 = 3.39 turns lock to lock, which is about all you want on a rockcrawler."
https://www.fourwheeler.com/how-to/suspension-brakes/129-0611-hydraulic-steering-tech/
No idea what the flow rate is of the stock rack allows, and if it would even be beneficial to try to use the stock rack for flow and metering. Could be a completely different type of valve that might not work with full hydro setup.
In general though more turns means less twitchy, which is better for road driving or higher speed driving. If you are in a rock buggy where you rarely go faster than 4lo speeds then fast wheel turning could be pretty nice.
Edit: too slow of a steering can also be an issue. Too many turns lock to lock means emergency maneuvers could take more effort and time.
For example: a Howe 2.5-inch bore x 8-inch-long double-ended cylinder like the one we installed on our project Mega Titan has a cylinder volume of 25.82 cubic inches. The Mega Titan's metering valve has a volume of 7.6 cubic inches, if we do the math: 25.82/ 7.6 = 3.39 turns lock to lock, which is about all you want on a rockcrawler."
https://www.fourwheeler.com/how-to/suspension-brakes/129-0611-hydraulic-steering-tech/
No idea what the flow rate is of the stock rack allows, and if it would even be beneficial to try to use the stock rack for flow and metering. Could be a completely different type of valve that might not work with full hydro setup.
In general though more turns means less twitchy, which is better for road driving or higher speed driving. If you are in a rock buggy where you rarely go faster than 4lo speeds then fast wheel turning could be pretty nice.
Edit: too slow of a steering can also be an issue. Too many turns lock to lock means emergency maneuvers could take more effort and time.
It would be pretty easy to figure out and have a hydraulics shop adjust the valve in the OEM rack. Turns lock-to-lock is set by the gearing in the Rack, and if the hydro doesn't match that it'll be fighting you for control, which would be interesting.
Ahh I knew I was missing something. Didn’t even think about the ram needing to match the racks’ turns lock-to-lock ratio. Yeah that would need to be done properly or else you’d be destroying parts or ripping the rack off the mounts.
Why don't we go this route and add hydro? Looks like a slim package too! I want to see how many full hydro failures I can find.
I don't think it would be a huge adjustment, eyeballing hydro rams on buggies vs the OE rack it's not a huge difference.
Actually, maybe I should do this off the Tundra rack, it's even closer in size to the hydro rams. But the boots would still be an issue.
https://www.steelsoldiers.com/threads/fail-proofing-full-hydro-steering.54804/page-4
Lots of talk about full-hydro on here. It sounds like unless you blew the pump, ram, hoses, and orbital all at once then you would still have some steering to get safely off the road in the event of a failure i.e. a hydraulic fluid leak somewhere. Not saying it for certain, but it seems like full hydro isn't as "unsafe" as some people claim it to be.
Lots of talk about full-hydro on here. It sounds like unless you blew the pump, ram, hoses, and orbital all at once then you would still have some steering to get safely off the road in the event of a failure i.e. a hydraulic fluid leak somewhere. Not saying it for certain, but it seems like full hydro isn't as "unsafe" as some people claim it to be.
kasnerd
Danny's Red Headed Step Child
- Joined
- Aug 15, 2019
- Messages
- 4,791
You should do it. What's an extra 5 grand on steering at this point?
Hmmm..... PSC DE Ram just sounds better and better.
Pretty sure his wife took his credit card priveleges away.