I was wondering if anyone has pictures of a looped power steering rack or could explain how they did it...im freakin confused on this one!! Thnaks guys! Im tired of all this power steering fluid flying everywhere.

 

anyone??? i did do a search and i believe chevy guy had pictures of a looped rack but the links dont work anymore.

 

Very easy. You have two ports on your power rack (different size too IIRC). Make sure you have some fluid still in the rack and run a high-pressure hose from one port to the other. You're basically recirculating fluid through that hose rather than running it up to the pump and back. This isn't the easiest thing to turn (my Pinto-style rack is MUCH easier to turn because of the gearing), but you free up weight with the power steering pump, resevoir and fluid all gone. Just looping the rack and not removing this stuff is pointless.

 

sweet...well for me it isnt really that pointless because the power steering fluid spits EVERYWHERE! I'm getting a rack at a later date and I really dont feel like spending 600 dollars on a manual from madman. I'm still removing the pump of course, lines, and res.

I'll have to check it out sometime sunday and see what your talking about. Think the hardest part that I didnt understand is leaving fluid in the rack. Fill it as much as it can hold right? Thanks alot bud!

 

Just leave some in there. Mine just had whatever was left over when I pulled the power steering off.

 

Madman rack drives great, my old looped rack was hard to turn when rolling slow, I was doing 6 pt turns to get into my garage.

 

thanks a lot for your help. progress is going very slow...after 3 jaw pullers to get the balancer i now have to find some long bolts to tae the hub off. i found out in the haynes and chiltons manuals that the bolt size is 5/16. yeah right! the bolts were actually 7/16 - 14 thread. so now i have to wait till tomorrow tilli get three of the 7/16ths size bolts slooooooooow progress so far.

 

wouldnt it be easier to just take the fluid out? I just took all the lines, pump and res off my car. I put a bucket under the ports and a piece of cardboard in front. Then I just turned it lock to lock several times and pushed all the fluid out. Plugged the holes and forget about it. Now I havent driven it this way but it is a track only car so I am not too worrried about making turns. Its still sitting up on stands right now and probably will be untill spring, but with the fluid in there it was much harder to turn. I mean why push the fluid around if you dont have to... Take it out and that just that nuch less work for your arms.

 

im not too sure on this but i think the rack will be ruined if it does not have any fluid in there...just an assumption

 

A little fluid isn't going to hurt anything. I turned my wheels once each way w/ the ports open to get some of the fluid out, then capped them off.

 

what did u use to cap them off?? i was just going to crimp them shut.

 

Regular metric bolts from the local store.

 

16mm and 18mm if i'm not mistaken