I'm changing over to a manual box and want to make sure that my low mount alternator will clear it. Does anyone have pics of one installed or overall dimensions? I'm asuming it's smaller right?

 

Nevermind. I just picked one up. It's a $hitload smaller. And ~50 lbs lighter.

 

yeah Iput one of those manual S10 boxes on my car and the guys at work thought I was crazy to give up the power steering option till one guy drove it and he was surprised. turns much easier than you would think. the room you gain under the hood is ALOT and like you said the weight reduction is pretty big to. look at the weight reduction thread, I posted there how much weight I had dropped just from this swap along with other things I had done. https://www.thirdgen.org/techbb2/sho...n&pagenumber=2

 

im considering doing this swap but what do i do about the engine belt? mine is 1 belt that wraps around to everything

 

you mean i can get rid of power steering!!!!

i could have good old powerless steering?


i like power steering,but i like manual even more.


what all would i have to do?whats its cost?

 

Remove everything related to the power steering system including the steering box. Find a 84-91 S10 manual steering box and bolt it in. Move the pitman arm from the f-body to the manual box.

Cost is whatever you can find a manual box for. There's always at least one on Ebay. You want the one with the 4 bolt top cover. The 3 bolt top cover is an early version and I'm not sure if the input and output shafts are the same size as the later versions. I know the 4 bolt top cover ones are direct bolt ins.

 

would this be good for aggressive daily city street driving?

i do like to take corners,but im not afraid of using alittle muscle.

 

when I had my quick ratio box on my car the steering wheel would have a little over 2 turns lock to lock, with the manual box I have now it has about 7 turns lock to lock. big increase in the number of turns but I like the weight reductiuon and the amount of space it opens up under the hood. if you are doing autocross I would not recomend the manual steering box, if you are just doing simply daily driving then I personally think its a great swap and don't be fooled by the term manual steering b/c its alot easier than you would think, not much muscle needed.

 

It's a lot easier because the 7 turns lock to lock increases the mechanical advantage needed to turn the wheels. Power assist steering uses hydraulic pressure to help with turning so it doesn't need the extra mechanical torque.

As mentioned above, for typical street driving you probably won't notice anything different except when making sharp turns like into a parking stall especially with wide front tires. Normal driving and lane changes will feel the same.

When autocrossing, you need to make turns a lot quicker and a normal power steering or quick ratio box is prefered.

My drag car has a manual box and the only sharp turns I need to make are when I turn into my pit.

If someone tries to sell you a quick ratio manual box, you probably wouldn't like it. To get the proper mechanical advantage to turn the wheels, you'd need a larger steering wheel like one from a truck. Personally I've never seen a quick ratio late model manual box typically found on S10's. There's a possibility they were available on some G-body cars but I haven't seen one yet. An early box probably came with a quick ratio option but those older cars (60's and 70's) also had larger steering wheels.

Manual boxes are only really hard to turn when you're not moving. Once the wheels start to roll, it's much easier to turn the steering.

 

just out of curiosity if a guy were to just simply remove the power steering pump, related belt and the 2 hoses going to the gear box would this be a bad thing or result in a failure at some point that could be bad or is this another way to have man steering with as little work as possible????? this is something I had always wondered but never did only b/c I didn't want to risk an accident in case it were a really bad thing to do.

 

The power box still needs fluid in it. Some racers have simply looped a hose between the inlet and outlet port of the steering box so that the fluid in the box recurculates.

This isn't a good idea for street use though. The power box is designed for hydraulic pressure power assist. It takes a lot more effort to turn it without that hydraulic pressure than a manual box is because it doesn't have that mechanical leverage inside the box.

 

leave it full of fluid and loop the 2 hoses together... effort will be pretty high at low speeds, but it does work.