Good Afternoon,

I am trying to replace the power steering system on my son's 75 Hurst Olds race car to a manual steering setup. I'm not sure any of the colenadde cars came with manual steering so trying to figure out what is a fairly straight forward concersion.

I am not finding any type of direct fit kit for this and the only kit that even references a 75 Olds is the Flaming River kit which is a bit pricy and has some fab work which is fine but over 1k cost seems a bit excessive.

It seems that the pitman arm replacement may be part of the stumbling block here but if anyone out there has done thiis on a 73-77 car, it would be great to learn what you found to work.

Thanks,
Grant

 

Power steering was standard equipment on all 1975 Cutlasses, so you won't find one on a factory car to use on your son's car. It's not surprising there are no kits for this as few people would want to make this conversion.

My guess is that you'll be fabricating much of what you need from scratch plus whatever you can use from other, similar cars that could have been had with manual steering.

Dumb question: is manual steering really needed? Don't race cars either just go straight or make constant left turns?

 

I would strongly suggest not doing this. The 73-77 cars are huge and heavy, and the Saginaw manual steering box is an extremely slow ratio to make steering forces slightly more manageable. How much weight are you really saving?

 

I appreciate the replys and input. I do understand this car is heavy and has a long wheelbase but since the original power steering gearbox is leaking excessively, this would be the time to consider a change like this. I did this years ago on my 69 442 race car with a factory manual gearbox and for drag racing it has been fine.

The weight savings (close to 30lbs with elimination of the pump, brackets, hoses, belt, and heavier power gearbox) and parasitic loss of the pump eliminated is significant enough to consider this conversion.

 

The 1969 442 came with manual steering as standard equipment (power steering was a $100 option), so it's not surprising that it was easily possible to find the parts and to refit a power steering car with manual steering and have it work ok.

The '69 442 weighed about 3600 lbs whereas the '75 Cutlass weighed about 300 lbs more.

A 30 lb weight savings on a car that weighs almost 4000 lbs is nothing. Less than 1%. It's hard to believe that that small a weight savings is worth all the trouble you'll have to go through to make this work. Heck, 30 lbs could be the difference in weight of two different drivers. How much does your son weigh? He could probably lose 30 lbs more easily that you can do this conversion.

 

30 lbs on a car that weighs over two tons is a nit. Not even 1%. Move the battery to the trunk for the same effect.

 

My 69 Cutlass wagon has factory manual steering. Parking the car is a bear. The large number of turns lock-to-lock also hinders handling. I'm in the process of converting to power steering.

 

@Oldsguy installed manual steering on his 69 Delta 88 years ago.

 

Also the factory base equipment in that car. I can't imagine that it was much fun to drive, however.

 

Why?

 

A handful of Base colonnade ('73-'77) cars went out with manual steering. I've never seen one, in years of yarding. (Going back to late nineties in the El Paso TX area). Used to buy the manual boxes, and attendant pitman arms due to their rarity. From '68 to '72 A body, and '68 to '79 X body. Sold most of them to a rebuilder back in the day. Still have a five gallon bucket of pitman arms (non wear type) but haven't inventoried or listed. The colonnade pitman arm for Manual steering is one rare bird.

 

I was wondering this myself.

 

How do you know this, especially if you've never see one?

 

I guess we'll have to see if he responds to the thread. I can mention it to him next time we talk.

As I recall we found the manual steering gear box and pitman arm on a 70s Pontiac Ventura. He had to cut the OE pitman arm and the Pontiac pitman arm in half and have the ends welded back together. At the time he did the conversion I think we were both members on ROP. I didn't know the Delta 88 had manual steering as base equipment.

 

Whether it's a good idea or not, the pitman arm will be the hardest to find. Rockauto shows manual steering boxes available.

 

Yup. Power steering was a $105 option in 1968 on both the Delta 88 and Delta 88 Custom. It was standard equipment on the 98 and Toronado.

 

This is a lot of trouble to go through to make the steering worse!

Question: why didn't he just go find a '68 Delta 88 with manual steering and transfer that over?

Answer: because he probably never would have been able to find one since, I would guess, maybe TWO '68 Delta 88's were equipped with manual steering.

 

Yes, I am a proponent of it. My first car a 67 Cutlass Coupe was born that way, then my 87 442 was converted to a manual box via a early 1980s Chevy S10 unit. And last but not least my 69 has a 1964 F85 unit swapped in. I love it, no more power steering noise, no more leaks, no more partial stalling when the power steering unit aggravates the engines normal operation in tight slow maneuvers, and no more belt squeal to contend with. Multiple headaches addressed in an instant. As far as negatives on a daily/occasional, most of that stems from pairing the units to modern tires. These units thrived when steering 4 inch contact patches of rock hard bias ply.

That is my understanding as well. Particularly early 1973 ultra base model Cutlasses. I believe the reason they are virtually impossible to locate today. Was that these cars were generally used abused and discarded. Unlike mid 1960s models, were base models were cherished. By the mid 1970s modern car consumers were all in on option laden models to compensate for lack of oomph.

 

A factory GM/Saginaw power steering system that is in good repair and has been properly maintained won't do any of those things.

 

I was young and dumb and.....full of myself. I didn't want all that power steering stuff hanging off the front of the engine. I just wanted an engine, headers, and an alternator which is what it ended up being. I was still in my forties and could do just about anything physically that I wanted to do. The steering effort wasn't that bad as I recall.