Ram Assist help

you need resistance for the pump to work. thats why it works when box reaches the end of travel, there is now a resistance.

Sounds good :spin1: Thanks.

I took it out today. I locked the front and tooled around a field. It seemed like it might be working but until I hit some rocks I won't know. The steering is hard and slow at idle and when cold. I replaced the pump before I started and it seemed to be fine then.
I'll play with it some more when time and family allows.

is the air out of the lines? Working it on the ground should help bleed the air out. Should be a notable difference.

I worked quite a bit on stands. No more bubbles in the fluid. The pump is nice and quite. Pretty sure it's bled good. Just seems the pump isn't putting out enough. I might try a pump mod. you drill out the pressure fitting for more flow. I tried that on my old pump though with the old box and it was a bust.

That or a PSC pulley to speed up the pump a bit.

shouldn't need to. Stock box/pump/pulley with a trail gear ram worked flawlessly. Turn it on the ground. Make the system work.

With the wheels in the air their is no resistance. So the steering box turns the wheels to where you want them before there is any pressure built up. Basically there is no steering assist because you don't need it. If the wheels were on the ground there will be resistance so there will be pressure to the ram.:dunce:
Another note that is interesting once I drove it I had a dead spot in the center where there was no assist. This was annoying.
I had drilled out the flow control orifice on my old pump to 5/32". I had no assist at idle. :flamemad: I had kept the orifice when I changed to a rebuilt pump.
I tried this orifice and could turn the wheel at idle with the locker in and tires aired down with my pinky. This sucked at speed because the steering was so touchy and no feedback. :looney: The orifice from the rebuilt pump was a loose 7/64". I drilled it out to 1/8" which is less than a 64th over. This gave steering very close to stock, even at idle with the front locked. I need to try this in the rocks yet but it looks like it will work fine.:woohoo:

uglystick said:

With the wheels in the air their is no resistance. So the steering box turns the wheels to where you want them before there is any pressure built up. Basically there is no steering assist because you don't need it. If the wheels were on the ground there will be resistance so there will be pressure to the ram.:dunce:

Click to expand...

I guess im confused what you are getting at. What you wrote is my point exactly. you need to have the tires on the ground to have resistance and make the pump AND ram work and get fluid in and air out..... :dunno:


But glad its working. :thumbup:

Keep in mind that the bigger the ram the slower it will be. If you wanted quicker response you should have went with a smaller diameter.

in4aride said:

I guess im confused what you are getting at. What you wrote is my point exactly. you need to have the tires on the ground to have resistance and make the pump AND ram work and get fluid in and air out..... :dunno:


But glad its working. :thumbup:

Click to expand...

Yep. Just repeating what you said. A little differently.
Tanks