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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Aug 2008
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    Default Tractor power steering retrofit

    The power steering unit on our Ford tractor stopped working one way awhile back. Took awhile but I managed to pull it apart and find a stuffed thrust bearing, but in a twist the bearing inner race is actually ground as part of the steering valve. Parts are available as in throw the whole lot away and buy a complete new assembled unit and part with your arm, leg and left eye as payment. Oh and we will not guarantee said part of you have a loader fitted, which we have.

    Anyhow, internet searches bought up a retrofit kit made in the US, for around AU$2000. 520c138f-77c1-4085-a296-228bde69cb08.jpg


    Only the existing power steering pump it reused, everything else thrown away and a orbital steering valve and hydraulic ram are made up to give you the power bit of the steering. I did not bother contacting the seller as by the time you paid freight and taxes would would be up around the $2500 mark, instead I decided to make my own version.

    Some calculations decided on a 2.5" ram with a 1" rod and an 210mm stroke will be the ticket. For a metering valve a 6 cu in" per rev Char Lynn copy (made in Italy) was purchased from US ebay and arrived forthwith. This would give around six turns lock to lock similar to the old unit.

    Hydraulic seals, rod and honed cylinder materials were purchased and a rough design for the cylinder come up with and fabricated. When the head gland was on the last procedure, the member from the military turned up and annoyed me. He turns up from time to time and annoys me greatly. His name is Major Fu Cup. He left after some repairs were done What happened was when drilling the hole for the oil inlet it went too deep and broke through into where the rod seal was positioned. This ram is designed so the removable cap holds the wiper and it also retains the U cup seal. Just makes it easier to replace seals down the track if needed. The gland has a bronze bush installed also. The ram piston is threaded onto the rod with a scotch key to retain it. This was to make the ram more compact, although if I was to build a Mk2 version there would be other changes as well to make it even more compact.

    Finally the ram was completed and tested to 3400psi and no leaks. It will run at 1100psi.

    20180602_162305.jpg20180527_200854.jpg20180527_155541.jpg
    Gold, the colour of choice for the discerning person.

  2. #2
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    Aug 2008
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    near Rockhampton
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    Default

    I started on the steering valve housing. Milled up some 10mm plate for the base, and some 100mm RHS to hold the steering valve. Work stopped on that while went back to fitting the ram to the tractor. Removed an existing steering shaft and shortened and drilled, threaded it on the hor borer (7/8 UNF thread). This goes onto the end of the ram

    Found centre with the coax indicator, had no drill the right tap size, so had to bore the hole to final size.

    20180608_101819.jpg 20180608_094920.jpg

    To be continued hopefully this evening.
    Gold, the colour of choice for the discerning person.

  3. #3
    Join Date
    May 2013
    Location
    Rockhampton, QLD
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    68
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    454

    Default

    By jeez that Major Fu Cup gets around. He’s been here on many occasions.

    Ross

  4. #4
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    Aug 2008
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    near Rockhampton
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    Default

    For the rear of the ram it has a tie rod end threaded in, an unusual thread 1" 16tpi. I had to internal thread the ram end on the lathe.

    The tie rod end taper is the usual 1 1/2" per foot or 7.125 degrees. It will go into a block of steel, which means cutting an accurate taper.

    I think I have mentioned it before but this is how I set the lathe to taper turn. John Stevenson shared this method some years ago.

    You set a parallel on the cross slide parallel with the ways, and affix it there. Then you set up a sine bar to the angle you want and put it against the parallel, then set the top slide to the sine bar. You have now set the top slide to the correct angle. The blue shows the taper is correct. My top slide has power feed which makes the cutting process run a bit smoother.

    20180608_083516.jpg 20180608_074905(0).jpg 20180608_074528.jpg 20180608_074402.jpg

    To align a centre popped mark the the centre of the chuck. I put a centre in the tailstock and another centre in front of that on the centre pop mark and an indicator on the front centre and when it stops going round and round in an orbital path the centre pop mark is centred.

    20180607_193310.jpg
    Gold, the colour of choice for the discerning person.

  5. #5
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    Aug 2008
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    near Rockhampton
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    Default

    A rough fitting to the tractor to determine placement

    20180608_105552.jpg


    Briefly moving onto the steering valve. It has a 12 tooth 16/32 spline to mate a shaft to. That is an involute spline, 16DP with a tooth depth of 32DP, so a sort of stub tooth gear. The program gearotic is capable of drawing this gear and if I had a CNC mill with third axis would easily cut it.

    I do have a 3D printer though and printed out a test shape. Fitted nicely. I was thinking of using it on the optical comparator as a template to grind up a fly cutter.

    20180603_090544.jpg
    Gold, the colour of choice for the discerning person.

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Jul 2016
    Location
    Melbourne
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    35
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    Default

    Nice work RC, how is your power compound set up, like JS did with little timing belts and a stepper? Did you have a job in the past that needed it? How come you didn't use the TTA on the monarch?

  7. #7
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    My top slide is powered by a mill power feed unit. Years ago I found a cheap one on ebay. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRoTzFMPVho

    Did not use the taper turning on the 10EE as this other method is far far quicker to set up and you get a good result first go.. I have never fully set up the TT attachment on the 10EE. It never came with the bed clamp.
    Gold, the colour of choice for the discerning person.

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Aug 2008
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    near Rockhampton
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    Well that marathon is over, who would have thought cutting a spline would be so drawn out.

    Well when you do not have the right materials on hand to make the cutter and make do with some mystery metal it tends to get drawn out a bit.

    Note to self. Go buy some silver steel to have on hand.

    So I go start thinking of cutting the spline that will fit into the steering unit. Have a read of here of the first and sixth page as they contain all the interesting photo's and writeup -->> Involute shaft as to how to do it.

    I ended up drawing the gear in gearotic, turning it into a dxf, scaling up the dxf to 10X. then printing it out on overhead projector film. That then went onto the optical comparator. Thinking I would be clever and grind a form tool by hand. Well that wasn't going to happen. Maybe if one had some kind of optical profile grinder it would have been possible. So I did the calculations to make the tools to make the cutter. Have no silver steel on hand, I used some HSS round bar ground to the calculated size then sliced and welded onto a square shank, then the top surface ground.

    Putting it on the comparator yielded this result 20180612_084832.jpg You can just make out the gear profile, the cutter buttons are quite close.

    making a cutter out of mystery metal which was hardenable and about 40mm diameter (most likely 4140 or 1045 as it was a pin out of some piece of machinery) was pretty straight forward. this was the profile of the resulting round disc tool.

    20180612_091405.jpg

    Grinding a cutting edge then putting the tool into an eccentric holder and after many many re-sharpenings I ended up with a nice fit into the steering valve. I only wish it was as quick to do as it took to write this up. A CNC mill with 4th axis would have done it in a jiffy thanks to modern computing. Some silver steel would have had it done quicker as well.

    20180612_150132.jpg 20180612_134924.jpg 20180612_102932.jpg
    Gold, the colour of choice for the discerning person.

  9. #9
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    Aug 2008
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    near Rockhampton
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    Well it works. So I am happy, about the same lock to lock as before (just under six turns)

    Just have one hose a smidgen longer then it needs to be.

    I had to make a spacer/adapter up to bolt the new to the old. It also incorporates a seal and plain bearing. The spline was welding and pinned onto the old steering shaft. I just have to put the rest of the tractor back together now.

    20180616_131125.jpg 20180616_131114.jpg 20180616_101632.jpg 20180616_085723(0).jpg
    Gold, the colour of choice for the discerning person.

  10. #10
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    Jul 2016
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    Default

    Did you do your own hoses or just buy pre-crimped ones? Looks like a pretty neat installation.

  11. #11
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    I do my own hoses now. Crimp on hoses made up are triple+ the price of reusable fittings.
    Gold, the colour of choice for the discerning person.

  12. #12
    Join Date
    Aug 2011
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    Melbourne
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    Nice work RC. You would have to be pretty chuffed with the result.

    Edit: Also with re-usable hose fittings, fine tuning hose lengths and trimming a bit off is no big deal.

    Simon
    Girl, I don't wanna know about your mild-mannered alter ego or anything like that." I mean, you tell me you're, uh, super-mega-ultra-lightning babe? That's all right with me. I'm good. I'm good.

  13. #13
    Join Date
    Mar 2014
    Location
    South of Adelaide
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    Default

    Is that tractor a ford 4000? I'm a bit of a tractor junkie. Good job, I might copy what you have done for my 5000. You can buy stock splined shaft in 6" lengths, we use it at work as it is often cheaper that cutting the spline. We get it from our hydraulic component supplier, they do splined bushings to.

  14. #14
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    It is a 6600 tractor. We have given it a bit of a hard life. If I could buy a new one I would, they simply do not make them like this any more. Although 4WD would be nice, but it kills the turning circle. The 2wd ones are a bit scary going down inclines as they have no grip and just slide.

    I did a search for splined shafting but found nothing with the appropriate tooth count. The manufacturers seem to like splines that come out to a common diameter. In 16/32 it went from 9 to 11 to 13 tooth. With the OD's, 5/8, 3/4 and 7/8 respectively.

    Finished putting the tractor back together and fitted the loader frame. I am really happy now with the outcome, it is virtually identical to the old system without the cost. Well they say you get paid what you are worth, so the labour costs must have been nil.

    BTW you can buy a weld on spline inthe US to fit the steering unit, and in hindsight I should have done so as it would not have costed any extra in freight.
    Gold, the colour of choice for the discerning person.

  15. #15
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    Apr 2018
    Location
    Drouin Vic
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    633

    Default

    Great stuff. I'm nearing completion of what has become a fairly thorough restoration on my 4100 (started off as a few repairs, but where do you stop?), have put the O-ring kit through the power steering and got rid of the leaks but the only option to refresh the actual working side of things is a whole replacement unit which is, as you have said, prohibitively expensive. I might have to consider copying your work some time down the track.

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