Cracking Power Steering Boxes

[gofast321]

Hi All. I have a 1988 Suburban that I did a L83 GEN V swap. I finally got it running and moving but I'm having an issue with power steering boxes. I keep blowing the front of the power steering boxes out. I'm using an AGR power steering pump in the swap with a stock square body GM power steering gear box. This is the second one that has exploded on me. Any suggestions on what I might be doing wrong? I find it hard to believe that the pump would make enough pressure to do this type of damage. If the pressure was too high I would expect a line or fitting to burst first. Any suggestions?

I have ticket opened with AGR but thought I might get the opinion of some of the folks here first.

Thanks for the help.

[v30crewcab]

your steering pump is deadheading pressure. there's a little pressure valve in the back of the pump that is supposed to limit the pressure, and its not. friend of mine modified his and did the same thing. warranty that pump now!

[gofast321]

Thanks so much for the reply v30crewcab. I'm going to get on the phone with AGR tomorrow and push to get it swapped. I have never seen a pump do that before. I can't believe its making enough pressure to do that kind of damage. Thanks!

[v30crewcab]

yes. he split a cast iron toyota box in a custom swap. you can just swap a new end on your box to fix that.

[sweetk30]

Recent deal with them and reading lots of bad reviews I won't deal with them .

PSC has a better reputation .

Agreed you have a backup of pressure killing it from someplace .

[gofast321]

I got the AGR pump as part of a GEN V square body conversion kit. I have used AGR in the past and have been happy with their stuff but I also have read some recent reviews that haven't been great. I just hope they don't make the warranty process too painful.

[kglowacky]

just curious how long before the box explodes?

[gofast321]

I'm guessing the boxes are designed to fail in that way when pressure gets out of control. Both of mine have blown out in the exact same place. I blew out both of mine with less than a mile on each.

[gofast321]

Hi all. I just wanted to update this thread on the resolution to my issue...

I talked with the folks at AGR and they were incredibly helpful. We walked through some troubleshooting but ultimately they asked me to send the pump and my steering box to AGR so they cloud test them. They disassembled the pump and found what they thought was a piece of hose in the return portion of the pump which they thought may have been causing pressure spikes. They cleared the hose debris reassembled the pump and ran it on a dyno with no issues. They then completely rebuilt my reman steering box with new AGR parts (essentially a new AGR steering box). I got them both reinstalled tonight and both seem to work well. Only cost to me with the shipping.

I wanted to share with everyone because I thought the customer service AGR provided was top notch.

[Palf70Step]

Thank you for the follow up. It is good to hear about customer service like that.