Saginaw Steering Box Overhaul

[Doppleganger]

Ok - so I'm diving into another shallow end and attempting to overhaul my steering box. Truck (for the limited times it was driveable) never had anything noticeably bad with the steering. My biggest issue with it was it was puking oil out of every orifice and seal it had. I have the complete kit - new bearing and all. So far have the entire box disassembled.

When I opened it up, there was alot of metal shavings inside - my question is, is this normal for 37yrs of use, or did something fail? I cant find anything broken, but there's alot of debris in there. Whats weird is there was 2 longer white hairs on the back of the end plug, so its also possible that the PO messed with it as well. Wouldn't surprise me. Counted 24 ball bearings inside....have heard there should be 28. Dunno.

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[Turbo4whl]

The metal shavings could be from the pump, and not the steering gear. I don't know about the white hair

 

[Doppleganger]

On closer inspection, someone has been in this as 3/4 of the o-rings and a snap ring are all missing. At least all the ball bearings are accounted for. No wonder it was leaking so bad. How it worked at all is beyond me. So everything is torn down and soaking ATM. Will be fun getting it adjusted back to normal.

Do think the shavings were from the pump also.

No one has ever rebuilt one of these?

 

[Turbo4whl]

Do think the shavings were from the pump also.

About the shavings, did the pump run dry because of the leaks? Was the pump whining before you pulled the box?

After all that gunk is cleaned out, inspect every part of that box. If the shaving are from the box you should be able to see where they came from with your inspection.

 

[Doppleganger]

Well, I sent the old pump on its way with the motor - guy who rebuilt mine wanted it as a core. He said the pump didn't look too bad - my guess is its a JY replacement and not the original (that failed?). About every accessory on the thing had JY paint markings all over them. Everything the PO touched turned to ish.

 

[CalSgt]

I just did mine about a month ago, it had 24 balls & was a bit gunky but no shavings to speak of.

Tip: Use a piece of rubber hose in the body to hold the balls in as you feed them in to a port one at a time until you can see them at the other port, use a small screwdriver to push each ball in far enough to get the next started. Then use some grease on the crossover tube to hold the remaining balls in it while you insert it back into the ports. Carefully insert that assembly until the hose hits and slowly turn (thread) the inner piece as you press them back together while gently pulling the hose out.

I cut one of the teflon seals during assembly and was lucky enough to find a spare in the parts pile. The balls and compressing the teflon seals are the hardest parts of the whole job

There was one guy that had a great youtube how to but I don't remember who.

I looked through all my photos & couldn't find any of the assembly process

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[bucket]

@yevgenievich and @Vbb199 have also messed with the box internals a time or two. There's a few other members as well, but I can't say for certain who.

 

[Doppleganger]

There's a couple really good vids on the whole process. What I have found is that many of these boxes are close, but not exactly the same, so the location of snap rings, etc aren't the same as the vids.

You fellas that tore them apart....did you mark the threads to get it back close to where it originally was or did you start from scratch for the adjustment screws? I almost marked them but overall it didn't sound like it would be as good as if it was newly set with the new parts. Dunno.

THX

 

[Turbo4whl]

@yevgenievich and @Vbb199 have also messed with the box internals a time or two. There's a few other members as well, but I can't say for certain who.

You could add me to the list if you want to. Back in the day I also worked in the repair shop's machine shop for many years. Steering box overhaul (rebuild) was one of my many tasks. I serviced more than one or two small Saginaw boxes.

The reason there is a discrepancy on the ball count is because the early boxes used half ball bearings and half plastic spacer balls. The spacer balls were smaller in diameter so the total count was higher.

Today, the machine shop is gone. We are just parts changers. The former machine shop had one guy overhauling engines, another automatic transmissions, another on the electrical bench. Starters, alternators, power convertors distributors etc.

I did all the other stuff, hydraulic pumps, motors and cylinders. Drive axles, steering boxes and the occasional manual transmission.

Before my tour in the machine shop we had another guy relining brake shoes. Something about cam grinding asbestos brake blocks wasn't good.

We all shared doing the overhaul of the pile of carburetors depending who wasn't busy with their other jobs. Did you know that most all medium duty gas powered trucks had Holleys, even the GMC's?

 

[Turbo4whl]

Chris, I marked or measured everything I took apart. We also had books for everything too. Every job was step by step from the book. Yes we learned short cuts here and there.

No internet or you tube then. Computers still had punch cards or tape reels.

 

[yevgenievich]

It is relatively straight forward. Almost looked like that one was packed with grease, while it should not be so.

This was z28 box internals getting ready to put back together.

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[yevgenievich]

Important when put together to adjust for right amount of play. Can either use specific tools, or works well by feel. Feel how it goes through the center.

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[Doppleganger]

I'm more concerned with getting the adjustment screws to where they should be. After finding its been previously messed with, not sure it was right to begin with.

 

[TPISly-C10]

at first i was to rebuilt mine too....at the end i buy a Borgeson close ratio instaid!

 

[bucket]

You could add me to the list if you want to. Back in the day I also worked in the repair shop's machine shop for many years. Steering box overhaul (rebuild) was one of my many tasks. I serviced more than one or two small Saginaw boxes.

The reason there is a discrepancy on the ball count is because the early boxes used half ball bearings and half plastic spacer balls. The spacer balls were smaller in diameter so the total count was higher.

Today, the machine shop is gone. We are just parts changers. The former machine shop had one guy overhauling engines, another automatic transmissions, another on the electrical bench. Starters, alternators, power convertors distributors etc.

I did all the other stuff, hydraulic pumps, motors and cylinders. Drive axles, steering boxes and the occasional manual transmission.

Before my tour in the machine shop we had another guy relining brake shoes. Something about cam grinding asbestos brake blocks wasn't good.

We all shared doing the overhaul of the pile of carburetors depending who wasn't busy with their other jobs. Did you know that most all medium duty gas powered trucks had Holleys, even the GMC's?

Noted! And yes, that's because Holleys are good!

I'm more concerned with getting the adjustment screws to where they should be. After finding its been previously messed with, not sure it was right to begin with.

I definitely wouldn't trust the previous adjustment. I know of may people that used to mess with those, trying to tighten up a worn out front end. Usually, they just went too far and the steering wouldn't self-center while driving down the road.