I went to Village Ford Parts where I've ordered from before and for my truck in this pic here:



I'm thinking that hose 17, the return from the steering fluid cooler, would be a good place to put the Magnefine filter. Plus the cooler is in front and once the grill is removed, should be fairly easy to access.

That would also be the hose I would pull off the cooler to drain the system by letting the pump do the work.

 

That sounds like a plan. I will pull my grill and look at this approach.

 

I will at one point pull my grill also and look at what I got on my truck to be sure... I meant to do the R&R of the power steering fluid sooner... AND, with me being OVERKILL, maybe I'll catch a sample when I do my system and send it in to Blackstone to see how it looks.

 

I stand corrected... the link I posted was for 2017 F650/750... I looked in my factory manual and it does not say the capacity of the power steering system...

I'll find out how much when I do mine.

 

The return line to the reservoir I used is on the bottom of the reservoir . On my reservoir there were two hoses on the bottom of my reservoir

a thick one which I assumed is the pump feed

and a thin one which I assumed is the return. This one is standard 3/8ths hoses size.

I moved the return line from the res return to the filter in.

then I put a new 3/8ths line from filter out to the res return port on the reservoir.

may not be the best setup but it works and does not interfere with pump pressure.

the fluid went from super dark to bright red super fast.


but I will say..with all the particles and discoloration I had…my pump is probably on its way out..,and it’s probably my fault due to the 37’s and me believing forum advisors that said I could bang away at the pinion arm when I did my pinion arm drop replacement. They said bang away…won’t hurt anything…nothing I could do would equal the road shock from high speed bumpy bump driving.

if I wee to do a pinion arm drop again…I would run the engine so that the pump is circulating fluid…the map gas heat the pinion arm ….while using a puller. Assuming the fluid would help cool the box.

the method I used was to put a puller on the arm…tighten the puller and tsp until it piped off. It took a lot of tightening and taping with a 2lb hammer. When it finally did come off it was pretty spring loaded and scared the crap out of me. It also deformed the shaft end and I had to buy a specialty tethered tool to reshape and re thread the shaft end.

 

It ain't easy, nor cheap being cool Fritz... No doubt about it...

My fluid reservoir has 2 lines also... Pretty easy looking at it. The thicker hose has to be the supply to the pump because it goes towards the firewall while the smaller hose goes towards the front where the cooler is. I'll double check all that when I take my grill off which I may do real quick before I have to pick up my son from school at 3 p.m.

So I'll assume the smaller hose is the return and goes to the cooler... I'm thinking if I do a filter because of course, overkill, I'm thinking about it now... I'll run it in the return line from the cooler.

 

Okay so I confirmed that the upper steering cooler hose is the return hose that goes back to the reservoir. I tugged at the hose in front and it moved under the reservoir.


That hose i have my thumb on... Return to reservoir.


Plenty of room to put a filter inline and easy to get to.

Since I removed the grill, I installed cable loom on the single green light wire from the plow harness that cuts across the front behind the grill. Been wanting to do that for awhile now...




This was a hose that the wire was cabled ties to... It had a protective sheath on it but since I'm overkill, I covered it with cable loom and further up the hose for more protection.




All protected and feeling better about it now..


Yep, the cooler's Made in China...

 

Did the flush today. Used just shy of 1.5 qts to flush it out. Then probably about 26 oz to fill it up... I'll post pics later... The wife is waiting for me in the pool...

Okay out of the pool and cooking supper now...

Started the truck and got the oil up to 100 degrees or so... Wanted the power steering fluid at least warmed up some.


That's the return back to the reservoir... Be prepared to pull like a MFer... But it did come off...


These are worth their weight in gold... Hose clamp pliers...


these make easy work of those factory spring clamps.


Had an old curved hose laying around that worked perfectly to direct the old fluid into the pan... I have the return line clamped to the pan as well...


Looks to be 3/8" ID hose in the fluid circuit.


This is what is left in the reservoir after I shut the truck off.


For the third and last flush, I plugged the return line with a 3/8 rachet extender. Didn't think of it for the first two...


Cleaned off the reservoir so I can read the level better...

I took a sample and will send it off to Blackstone to see what kind of condition the 106k mile Mercon LV is in... It's probably just good to flush out, refresh the fluid and get all the wear particles out of the system.

The fluid didn't look horrible but was darker than the fresh fluid and also had a stench to it -- like almost a burned smell to it.

 

Hey guys, this is the UOA report on my original Mercon LV from the power steering system that I let drain out. It came back better than I expected actually...

 

Thanks for the pics Dave, this is something I need to get done on mine. I tried the turkey baster deal & didn't get enough out to amount to much.

 

No problem... Happy to help. I've been meaning to do this since prior to 100k miles... I started looking into disconnecting the right hose and start the truck to push most of the fluid out, like what can be done for the transmissions but I've just been doing pan drains on my truck..

Finally got to looking at this harder thanks to fritz's thread here... I don't think I'll go to 100k miles, probably 50k miles and do it again. I'll round off and do it again at 150k miles I'm thinking...