Disconnecting power steering

[JanGeo]

In a 62 Rambler it may not be measurable my 65 Rambler had manual steering 6+ turns stop to stop - it was a hand full to turn quickly but it used to track the ruts in the road like lane change assist.

In my xB is see a little hit on the fuel usage when coasting in neutral when I have to turn the steering so it does affect it a little when it is working but probably not much at all under no load or else you would have a lot of heat build up.

[dieselbenz]

Originally Posted by Jay2TheRescue

Draining the fluid would remove the lubrication from the steering box/rack & pinion (Whichever your vehicle is equipped with).

NO

Originally Posted by dkjones96

Has it even been proven that disconnecting that pump saves a measurable amount of fuel?

Yes.
http://media.ford.com/article_displa...ticle_id=27976

Originally Posted by JoeBob

As per my earlier comment with the '62 Rambler, there was no difference in MPG. with or without power assist.

My FE went from 28 to 31 when i removed the PS. It made a measurable difference in both fuel economy and power.

Originally Posted by JoeBob

As per my earlier comment with the '62 Rambler, there was no difference in MPG. with or without power assist.

I didn't know the 62 Rambler had magic PS.

Originally Posted by JanGeo

In my xB is see a little hit on the fuel usage when coasting in neutral when I have to turn the steering so it does affect it a little when it is working but probably not much at all under no load or else you would have a lot of heat build up.

Try spinning the PS pump at 3000rpm.

[theholycow]

Originally Posted by tjts1

My FE went from 28 to 31 when i removed the PS. It made a measurable difference in both fuel economy and power.

10% is a lot.

I'd love to get together all the reasonable-looking things that have improved people's fuel economy by 10%. Put them all together and my car would manufacture gas that I could sell.

I'm not arguing that this particular mod isn't responsible for 10% but they can't ALL work that way.

[Jay2TheRescue]

Originally Posted by tjts1

NO

I'm confused. Are you saying that the gears in a steering box or rack & pinion do not need lubrication?

[dieselbenz]

My steering rack is going on 2 years and 25k miles without PS fluid in it. No failure, noise or any negative side effects. You be the judge.
Even if you drain the rack upside down for a couple of days (I did) there will still be a film of oil left inside the rack coating every surface. Once you seal the banjo bolts to the rack that oil will remain inside for the life of the vehicle. This is more than enough lubrication.

This is a used BMW E36 rack I installed in my E30 2 years ago. I disconnected the PS lines, drained the oil, slipped a couple of very short lengths of hose (red) over the banjo bots and torqued them down.


If you have the time here is the proper way to depower a steering rack.
http://www.flyinmiata.com/tech/depower.php?x=1
Notice that when the pinion comes out, its actually lubricated with grease from the factory, not PS fluid.

The PS fluid doesn't come in contact with the rack and pinion gear teeth.

Originally Posted by theholycow

10% is a lot.
I'd love to get together all the reasonable-looking things that have improved people's fuel economy by 10%. Put them all together and my car would manufacture gas that I could sell.

My bmw has a 1.8 liter 16 valve engine with cams setup for peak power at the expense of low end torque. With PS still in place the idle would actually drop when I turned the wheel at a stand still. My friend managed to stall it once when he was really aggressive with the steering wheel at idle.

cheers
Justin

[pstrbrc]

Yeah, the link tjts1 gave you is the right way to do it. For my driving 25,000 miles is about 7 months, so when I depower mine I'll do it the hard/right way. Mostly because if you do it the quick-and-dirty way, and the rack does get scored/begins to bind/seizes it's too late to fix it. But, quick-and-dirty does work, and a number of friends have done it. btw, 10% fuel saving? Possible, sure. Little engine, aero car, cruising at 50mph doesn't require much hp. Even a small power steering pump (mine is a second gen. Escort) takes about 1.2-1.5 hp to maintain pressure even when there's no steering assist demand.

otoh, my Merc Grand Marquis? Not only would I NOT want to drive that boat w/o p/s, but considering what it takes to push it through the atmosphere, I wouldn't expect p/s delete to help FE much.

[JanGeo]

Well with the 3 turns stop to stop ratio on my xB not a good idea - take yesterday when I turned off Rt 6 at the Saggamore bridge to go south on the Cape side of the canal the left turn after the exit ramp had a low unmarked island curbing in a wide intersection that I could not see until I was almost on top of it - without even a second to think I whipped the wheel to the left more than half a turn and missed it by inches. I would consider running an electric motor drive however but I am not sure how far ahead I would end up - I do have variable assist steering so I don't know what determines the amount of assist - the RPM of the pump or the ECU sensing the speed and electrically adjusting the assist. Seems like a small powerful brushless Airplane Hobby motor and controller for about $100 or less could run it on 12 volts easy. I too have felt the steering assist fight back on a snap of the wheel at idle straining the engine in the process.

Hummm I wonder what the Prius uses . . .

[theholycow]

Variable assist is controlled by vehicle speed.

Prius uses electric power steering, as do other hybrids and many small non-hybrids (such as my VW). I wouldn't be surprised if newer xB's do too.

[GasSavers_JoeBob]

Originally Posted by tjts1

I didn't know the 62 Rambler had magic PS.

Not magic, just pretty much unnecessary. IIRC, the Rambler used sort of a hydraulic ram connected to the fairly conventional steering gear. The car was pretty light, so steering was fairly easy even without PS.

[jcp123]

Originally Posted by JoeBob

Not magic, just pretty much unnecessary. IIRC, the Rambler used sort of a hydraulic ram connected to the fairly conventional steering gear. The car was pretty light, so steering was fairly easy even without PS.

That's pretty well how it was in the Mustangs back then as well. Mine's not had its PS working for going on 4 months now and I don't really even notice it (though a '67 Mustang Convertible's listed curb weight, I assume with a V8, was a rather porky 3045lb). I'd like to get it working just because since the car has it it should work, but on my next car (early 60's Falcon?), I don't want PS.