Steering Box Upgrade to fix numb, single pinky steering feel

[xgecko]

I am in the process of determining what the best course is for updating the single pinky steering in my 69. I am finding it very dangerous given how well my car handles; it gives no feedback whatsoever and if I look away for a moment I tend to veer off the road as I do not feel the wheel turning. Back when our cars were built the blue-ribbon standard for steering was that it should require virtually no effort so granny could maneuver her mega-boat with aplomb but for modern performance driving it is not just horrible but potentially even deadly. I have to be ever vigilant when driving my Toronado as it responds so quickly to the slightest steering input; I have found it all too easy to go off course if I am not paying attention as I get no feedback of any kind from the steering wheel. While I have managed to develop enough skill with it to corner quite well, it takes far more concentration than it should and it is at times somewhat scary. This weekend I passed a car at full throttle and the steering was so squirrely when it crossed the chatter lines in the middle of the road I scared myself to the point of deciding this has to be fixed. I almost needed new... well, I think you get the point!

Having done considerable research I determined that our boxes are actually pretty nifty and rather unusual in some respects. The key feature I decided I wanted to keep is the 16:1-13:1 variable ratio; most of the performance boxes I could find were fixed ratio at 12.7:1 which would make parking lot steering much less pleasant.

The key areas I am looking to improve are on-center feel and significantly increased effort. There are several options available to us; virtually any Saginaw box from any GM car will fit with at most a few modifications, however, there are a myriad of boxes with widely varying properties out there and it was not clear what would work best. I want a slower ratio near center as the car tracks incredibly well with very little input, and I want to improve the feel.

After looking at all sorts of boxes from cars like the 88 Monte Carlo SS or the 96 Impala SS along with aftermarket boxes from the likes of CPP I called Lee Manufacturing (I read about them in an old Car Craft article on Steering Box upgrades) to ask what they could do for me.

Given the unique properties of our boxes I think I have decided to send in my box and pump for rebuilding. One nice thing they will be doing for me is to add an inlet to the pump for my Hydroboost unit. This is somewhat more desirable than the TEE fitting I used for now.

Total cost for the box and pump rebuild along with the tweaks needed to update the performance is somewhere around $500 or so. If it results in significantly improved feel and control it will be money very well spent.

If you go with a remanufactured box from the local parts store you can save quite a bit of money but until someone does this it is a bit harder to be sure which one is the best for our cars. One factor is the total turning sweep; I definitely want to preserve the total turn angle and it was not clear which boxes will do this properly.

http://lee-powersteering.com/index.htm

http://www.carcraft.com/techarticles/ccrp_0901_gm_steering_box_upgrade/viewall.html

[Twilight Fenrir]

Oh, is that whu the bloody thing is so loose? I thoight it was my steering damper, which I do have a new one for, but haven't put in..

The ease of steering is waaay to high on this car, I have to agree. My Fiero has really responsive steering, slide nudges can alter your direction quick, but there's still feedback, so it is controllable. I've gotten better with the Toro, but it does still dance arround quite a bit.

I've heard of people putting dual dampers on other cars before to increase steering effort, would this not be an easy, feasible solution?

[xgecko]

The dampers have nothing to do with steering effort; they merely absorb shocks or vibrations. The steering effort is controlled via a torsion bar thickness value. The thicker the torsion bar the less deflection for a given effort and the more you feel the road. Our cars have a very thin torsion bar similar to the one one on the right next to the pitman arm in the image below so it deflects very easily which then brings on the power assist.



Luckily the folks at Lee Manufacturing can swap in a thicker torsion bar which will increase the effort and they can change valving and presets to improve on center feel. All of this can be obtained by purchasing a box from certain other GM cars for quite a bit less, but what is hard to preserve is the nice variable ratio in our boxes so I felt it worth the money to send mine in later this year to have it upgraded.

I am really looking forward to seeing how the car handles when I can actually read the steering input. Right now I am getting pretty good a cornering, but the steering input is a truly critical bit of data and it will make a huge difference.

I'll be doing this upgrade sometime this winter; probably in November. I'll let you know what I think.