Hello all. Well, I got a 73 F250 with a 460 and 4speed 4x4. It's been manual steering as long as I've owned it and it was really starting to get on my nerves. I wanted to start takin her out this spring and summer but knew the manual steering could break my fingers. SO, my brother had a 76 sitting outside and after lots of bugging him finally talked him out of giving me his power steering setup.

I was abit intimidated at first but to my surprise everything hooked right up without issue. I hooked up the hydraulic ram to the axle, connected it, ran the hoses up to the pump, hooked up the power steering control valve, hooked it up. Filled it up with fluid and *POOF* i got power steering. But, it's not perfect.

It seems abit hard when I turn to the left, but to the right is really nice and easy. My brother said I probably just need to run it for a few days and it'll get better. I checked for leaks and didn't find any. I also have alot of slop before the steering actually kicks in, so we checked by rocking the steering wheel back and forth in the sloppy spot and my brother saw that the slop was right where the pitman arm connects to the control valve.

SO, my question and problem is, I have no idea what that part is called. I know it's similar to a balljoint. What is this part called? Can I simply replace that part and not the entire control valve since the valve is ridiculously expensive?

I'd appreciate any opinions and help I can get. I also took the liberty of taking photo's of the entire procedure incase anyone wants to see how it was done. My truck simply had a straight bar running from the pitman arm to the tire. As for where the hydraulic ram was, I just had a stabilizer shock. Surprisingly, it all came apart easy and bolted right in. I'm so happy having power steering, I'd just like it to be abit tighter without so much slop. Thanks in advance!

 

It's the ball stud, Dennis Carpenter has the repair kit for 50 bucks.