I did the 90's Jeep Grand Cherokee steering upgrade on an old 65 Chev and noticed my steering wheel is a little harder to turn than before. Does the box determine this or the pump? It feels like a newer car not an old car that you could turn with one finger. Is this normal?
Thanks

 

That is normal

What you are referring to is Steering effort.
This is measured by how much input force it takes before the steering box begins turning.

That is controlled by a component inside the steering box called a Torsion Bar (referred to a lot as T-Bar)

In the 60's when power steering was new, people wanted that "pinky" steering ability, giving a stark contrast to the old armwrestling of manual steering- The T-bars were quite small.

In the 80's & newer- the T-bars were bigger to help restore that Road feel.

Over on Team Chevelle in the suspension section is a Sticky Post by Jim Shea who worked at saganaw for years and years, and he has tech papers written up with the details and sizes.

The new AGR, Dana, and Lee Engineering Boxes all use HUGE t-bars- I've read a few complaints that they are TOO stiff... I had a Monte Carlo Box in a 69 elcamino a few years back, and it the really big T-bar in it (bigger than the JGC) and i felt it great- I loved it. I'm getting ready to do the JGC swap in my olds, and i've tested JGC boxes in a few friends cars- and its not as still as the Monte Box- but still much stiffer than stock.

I'm just going by memory here... you'd have to look at the tech pages for specifics, but i beleive Stock 60's boxes used something like a .165 t-bar, the JGC boxes use a .185 bar, and the AGR,LEE,DANA boxes are like .210
I believe the mid 80's Camaro/MonteCarlo boxes were also .210 boxes, but had the steering stops placed incorrectly for the A-bodys, so turning radius was lessened (i know my 69's was reduced just enough to be noticed)

So even though The Jeep Grand Cherokee boxes uses one a little smaller t-bar than the performance boxes- its still bigger than the stock size- so makes for a nice upgrade.

Steering box rebuilder can upgrade the T-bar in a stock box as well, so you could have your factory box rebuild w/ close ratio gears & a bigger t-bar for extra steering effort if you wanted- although i would imagine the JGC swap would be a lot cheaper. Depends how much originality you want to keep.

 

Great info,
I do like it better with a little more effort.
Thanks for the help!