Hello All, I'm finally getting around to mounting my 78 79 F250 4x4 power steering box on my 77 Highboy. Seems like I've ran into a little bit of a clearence problem. I've got my crossmember notched out plenty far enough back plus I've ground the lip completely off that turns upward along the top of the frame rail.

I installed the pitman arm on the box with the rather thick lock washer and the nut and tightened it up good. When I put the steering box in place on the frame with the frame spacer and loosely install the drag link and move the front wheels from side to side the pitman arm is still hitting the frame somwhat when the wheels are turned to the right and the pitman arm moves back it is still rubbing the frame. I have already ground off as much of the rear ear of the box where it sits near the top of the frame rail to gain as much clearence as I can there.

About all I know to do is use a thinner lock washer as to not let the pitman arm be tightened up as high as it is now to be able to have enough clearence.
Have any of you ran into this? If so, what did you do to correct it. Another question. Shoudn't the bottom of the steering box clear the top of the frame rail just a little bit too? Mine is right against it with the pitman arm rubbing. Any tips on this? Sorry for the lengthy post. Looks like I'm going to need to get my pitman arm spaced down some how. Thanks A Bunch!!

 

I spent the better part of a full day fitting the box to my '74, and finally wound up heating and dimpling the top of the frame rail with a large hammer, plus some additional grinding before I was happy with the Pitman arm clearance. Even now it's pretty close, but not touching. I can't see how you could adequately tighten the Pitman on the box output shaft if you tried to space it down, since the splines have to bottom out to be secure, as I see it.
Anyway, it sounds like you just need to do some more crafting on the frame to make yours work the way it needs to be. Good Luck! Steve

 

.............I just finished my conversion , but when I first started I took my torch and CUT that ridge part of the frame rail ....Completely OFF . It, is in the way and does NOT need to be there!! Also , your ps box needs to sit parallel with the frame if you want your pitman arm to swing in a perfectly Flat plane . sk

 

Thanks for the tips guys. I'll probably either do the heat and hammer trick or just grind it completely away. Stephen, your right, when you get to thinking
about it, the pitman arm does need to be completely bottomed out on the splines to be correct. I'll get it to work. Thanks So Much!!

 

I did my '74 12 years ago, and I did the same thing with the torch to get that lip out of the way - heated it, and smacked it with a hammer until it was flat again. I didn't have to notch the frame, but I put the steering box a little farther away than you guys do, with a custom drag-link to make up the difference.

 

I finished my convision last spring. There are some pics in my gallery if you want to look at them. There are more that I can post if they would help. I love my new system is 10x better.