Hi billnfi, chalkie and others...
To upgrade your Mk3 Transit manual steering box to power steering, you need 5 key components:
1. PAS box (the pipe work in this picture is non-standard)
2. Steering column lower coupling (you can't use the manual one - it's too long)
3. Drop Arm (manual one won't fit on PAS splines, and you'll probably have cut it off anyway (explained later!))
4. PAS pump, mounting bracket and idler pulley
5. PAS fluid reservoir
Plus the pipe work, fittings, longer drive belt and some PAS fluid.
As I am running a non-standard engine, I have used a different PAS pump, fluid reservoir and pipe work, so I don’t have pictures of these parts, but if I tell you what I have done, you should get a feel for what is involved in doing the job.
Here’s the process:
1. Within the engine bay, remove the steering column lower coupling pinch bolt from the clamp plate (at top of picture below) and move the coupling out of the way.
2. Under the wheel arch, pull out the split pin and remove the castellated nut on the drop arm ball joint (shown removed at bottom of picture below). Then use a ball joint separator to take them apart.
3. Undo the drop arm retaining nut (shown removed at top of picture above) and, in the words of the Haynes Manual, “use a suitable puller to withdraw the drop arm from the shaft”
. Having broken two hefty puller arms
, wrecked a special tool I made for the job
and engaged a local mechanic who failed to remove it with his 10 tonne hydraulic puller
, I ended up having to cut the old drop arm off
. If you research this subject, you will find that Transit and Land Rover drop arm removal can be a real nightmare. I always hate “burning bridges” by chopping good parts off, preferring to keep my options open for putting it all back together if it doesn’t work out. However, there was no choice here, so I chopped it (
very carefully)..
4. Back in the engine bay, remove the three bolts securing the steering box to the chassis plate, and remove it.
5. Next – the easy part – simply bolt in the power steering box (4 bolts, with holes already there for you on the chassis plate, see below). Torque them to 84 Nm.
6. Under the wheel arch again, attach the PAS drop arm (which has a master spline so you can’t get the alignment wrong) and torque the nut to 270 Nm.
7. Replace the castellated nut on the drop arm ball joint, torque to 115 Nm, and use a new split pin. I had a problem at this point in that the drag link ball joint which I sourced with my PAS drop arm had the opposite thread (where it attaches to the drag link) to the existing ball joint. I couldn’t just use the existing ball joint as it has a smaller tapered end, which rattles around in the drop arm hole. This may always be the case, or it may be because I have a County 4x4 with “heavy duty steering”. To cut a long story short, I got around the problem by having a tapered “cone” machined to fill the gap as suggested by H_munch (see below, just visible between the ball joint thread and the drop arm). This has worked perfectly so far. You may or may not need to do this.
8. In the engine bay, do up the steering column lower coupling pinch bolt to 30 Nm.
From this point on, I have used a non-standard set-up, but you will need to:
9. Fit the PAS pump, torque the M10 bolts to 58 Nm and the M12 bolts to 97 Nm.
10. Fit the idler pulley.
11. Fit the fluid reservoir.
12. Connect up the pipe work. The easiest solution would be to source the correct Transit pipe work (good luck
). As I was using a non-standard system, I had to make up my own. You will need:
a. Very high pressure flow hose from pump to steering box.
b. Lower pressure return hose from steering box to fluid reservoir.
c. Low pressure supply hose from fluid reservoir to pump.
My connections and solid pipe work entering the PAS pump were specially fabricated as I failed to find the correct Transit fittings. The flow and return connections are clearly marked on the steering box.
13. Fit the correct drive belt and adjust the tension using the idler pulley, then torque up the bolts to 28 Nm. The drive belt is just a longer version of the alternator / water pump drive belt, that now includes the idler pulley and PAS pump.
14. Fill the fluid reservoir with the correct PAS fluid (Ford Spec SQM-2C-9010-A)
15. Carefully bleed the system. To do this, turn the steering from lock to lock with the wheels clear of the ground and the engine off. It turns surprisingly easily. Top up the reservoir as necessary. Then start the engine and repeat the process at idle, keeping the reservoir topped up.
Then –
ENJOY what must be the very best improvement you can make to any manual steering Mk3 Transit (after fitting a pokey engine
). Believe me, it is definitely worth the hassle and expense.
Hi, my partner and i have just bought a late 89 2.0 petrol transit/camper and we are now wondering how we go about fitting power steering, I'm sure hundreds of people must have asked the same question. I am reasonably mechanically competent, but am not sure of exactly what I need in terms of parts, pulleys,brackets etc. Its a December 89 registered 2.0 swb pinto engine with 205 stamped on it if that bears any relevance. Many thanks to all who read this, any advice whatsoever would be very gratefully recieved. cheers Howard. 
