Hey all. About 100 miles into the conversion, I am feeling resistance and a clunk as the wheel is turned from center. Once off center there is no further symptom other than the assist seems weak at low speeds. I checked the rag joint and steering linkages underneath and didn’t find anything loose. The noise becomes more pronounced as it is driven and warms up, and I had problems with the Saginaw pump whining initially so it may be bad, but would that cause the box to behave this way?
Sounds like something might not be all the way tight. My suggestion would be to have someone turn the wheel to duplicate the noise while your under the vehicle looking a loose component. Ideally do it with the tires on the ground.
What fluid did you run in the saginaw?
Originally it was Mercon V, but there was pump whine when hot, so I siphoned off what I could and added Royal Purple. I’m not having pump whine anymore, but the new symptoms arose, so I’m also wondering if I overheated the Saginaw and did some permanent damage. The link has a short video where you can hear (and almost feel) the noise and resistance. From the driver seat it seems like a column issue.
You may have two issues, Low assist and the clunk. That clunk is a loose component, either worn or not all the way tight. Get a second set of hands and have someone duplicate the noise while you look at everything that moves.
Thank you. I’ll keep her in the garage until I can pull in a helper, and we can get to the bottom of it.
Summary to date, a PS cooler fixed my pump and pressure issues, but the resistance and clunk when it finally moves feels like it is in the column both from the wheel and at the rag joint. Everything from the box on is tight. I’ve looked at the shop manual diagrams, but it doesn’t clearly show what might have shifted or broke in the column when it was collapsed about 3/4" to connect the new steering box and rag joint.
Has anyone had this symptom with a column and might be able to point me in the right direction? You can see/hear the issue in the video I posted above.
Hey all, just an update in case someone else runs into this problem. The Borgeson conversion kit should come with a fluid cooler, particularly if you have a big block or a 351 that will heat up the box and the lines. The cooler will fix the pump whine and the loss of steering boost. The resistance and squeak is a by-product of the new box and it’s alignment with the steering column. I ended up loosening the column attaching bolts at the under dash and firewall and shifted the column alignment to better match the slightly new angle of the Borgeson box’s input shaft. That fixed 80%, but I still had some slight resistance and squeak, so I shot some WD-40 up into the column right above the rag joint and voila! no more issues. It isn’t a perfect solution, and eventually I may need to do more realignments or replace the bushing at the end of the column, but for those who experience this in the future, your problem is pressure from the box making the shaft rub against the bushings in the column.