steering gear box

[chevn-up]

hey hey, 85 2wd. here. Anybody know of replacing their box with a monte carlo box of the same year ? Doing some research, so the Monte's is a 12 to 7 ratio vs. the 14 to 1 that the trucks have ? Quicker steering for sure? 25 spline input shaft and 32 spline output shaft makes it compatible ?. Any info on this would help.

 

[Camar068]

See link below. As import the ratio is, is the turn radius. See the chart. Thanks for bringing it up, it's crossed my mind before.

http://www.hotrod.com/articles/ccrp-0901-gm-steering-box-upgrade/

 

[chevn-up]

Thanks for the article. Very cool info man. Looks like the 88-90 "B" body cars have the perfect box for an upgrade. 12-7 ratio, plus the full 87 deg. turning radius, (provided ya get the pitman arm with the box). The fact that the input shaft bolts right up to a mid 80's truck steering shaft, and the oil lines are metric, OMG. Gonna start looking through the yards.

 

[dphipps]

Truck steering boxes mount to the outside of the frame, where the car box mounts to the inside.

Maybe the guts could be swapped?

 

[chevn-up]

So true dphipps. It burst my bubble when I located a 90 Caprice only to discover this fact. Swapping the guts may work. If the sector shaft and the rack piston (from the caprice box) can be switched from right to left. Both boxes are a constant ratio, so the sector shaft may be the same size and dimension, thus making it possible.....?

 

[dphipps]

I had the same idea as you at one point but it never got far after I noticed the boxes mounted on opposite sides...

Might be time to do some research

Edit:

They only mount different, don't they? Or are the boxes actually mirrored? I will have to check this out tomorrow. I have a Gbody box somewhere