IT'S HERE : Jeep JK BIG Bore XD Steerng Gear Box - NOW SHIPPING

cameleer

New member
Got mine installed last week.

I got to see a side-by-side compression of the stock steering box and this new box while at the King of the Hammers, and I was very impressed with it.

The body is larger and was slightly hitting the radiator reservoir, I moved the reservoirs tie-wrap so it pulls from the opposite side to fix this.
Steering feels them same. The only difference should be a much stronger steering box with a little more power. With my large tires and upgraded steering components, this should finish it up nicely.

Here's how my 2013 JK Rubicon is set up so far.
37"Mickey Thompson Baja MTZP3 tires, Dynatrac ProRock44 front axle housing, CORE 44 rear axle housing, RCV front and rear axle shafts, Synergy heavy-duty tie rod, Dynatrac Heavy-Duty Ball Joints, Rock Krawler X-Factor lift, Bilsten 5160 shocks, Reid Racing knuckles, 456 gearing, EVO ProTeK Skid plate System, EVO rock stars, Teraflex tire carrier, Genright front and rear aluminum bumpers, Genright full roll cage, Baja Designs LED lights, JW Speaker headlights, Warn winch and a few other small things.

steer_box.jpg

I still want to install some coil overs, just having a hard time deciding which ones.
 
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sunnysideup

Active Member
Awesome! Be sure to posts up pics :thumb:

Will do!
Radiator has cracked plastic on passenger side...steams like a tea pot. -so it is being replaced at the same time with a Griffin one... I figure having that out of there will make changing the steering box easier. This winter was rough on the jeep... replacing the leaking tranny lines too... and the synergy boots on everything steering, gonna catch the front brake pads while I'm at it. :crazyeyes:
 

chitown35

LOSER
I can't wait to see a review of how this thing handles 37s, aired down, locked, and in the rocks.

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sunnysideup

Active Member
Got it all put in... big heavy piece of equipment! I needed help to get the bolts in while holding it there.

Since I had a lot of projects, and the radiator was out while I worked... It really went simple! I imagine it would be very tight to work on with everything else in there.

But... the steering shaft (between the wheel and the box) gave me a couple hours worth of problems... I had to get it to "widen out" to fit on the shaft on the steering box. after fruitlessly trying to spread it out with a couple screwdrivers (now broken...lol) while it was still attached to the Jeep... I gave up and pulled it out, took it to the vice, used a big chisel to separate it and still had to fight it ! The back of the clamp had to open up so the bolt could go into the right place on the shaft. There was no easy way to do that while it was attached. If you doing this project, it might be worth it to just pull the steering shaft after the old pump is out, adjust it to fit the BOX... and then put it in.

WARNING- This gave my son plenty of time to mess around with the now disconnected steering wheel...which apparently turns many times in each direction. :thinking: So there's that... I'm going to have to see If I can find a way to get that steering wheel back where the Jeep thinks its straight. Not sure how the CPU figures it out... but it doesn't care about the hard parts being lined up.... It thinks I'm in a skid.... I might need to test that one turn at a time...

The other thing that hung me up for 40 min or so... is that it said there was a mark on the sector shaft (there actually was two). So I found it was impossible to line the first mark straight with the mark on the Box. It was a yellow dash across the bottom of the sector shaft (which was perpendicular to the top mark when the Box was at center). I then took the nut off the shaft and found the REAL mark to use for aligment :crazyeyes: Not PSC's fault... just mine trying to figure what on earth that other mark was!

I didn't have a wrench big enough for the Nut on the pitman arm... getting one from a friend... I had up to 1.5 inches... but the nut looks to be 1 inch and 9/16?

The New sector shaft is massive, the pitman arm is high quality... and I will give a test when I get it all working!

Glad it's all in, I won't get to test it until I sort out the steering stuff... which looks like it might be an adventure... I'm thinking I will disconnect the battery and then take the steering wheel cover off and see if there are any clues under there to line it back up... I'm also going to research if I have to shave a "reader" that will allow me to know how far out of adjustment it is? Maybe I can just clear codes and it will find the right spot... but somehow I think it's going to be one turn at a time until one of the settings doesn't bring up the Christmas lights.
 
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deezus

New member
Got it all put in... big heavy piece of equipment! I needed help to get the bolts in while holding it there.

Since I had a lot of projects, and the radiator was out while I worked... It really went simple! I imagine it would be very tight to work on with everything else in there.

But... the steering shaft (between the wheel and the box) gave me a couple hours worth of problems... I had to get it to "widen out" to fit on the shaft on the steering box. after fruitlessly trying to spread it out with a couple screwdrivers (now broken...lol) while it was still attached to the Jeep... I gave up and pulled it out, took it to the vice, used a big chisel to separate it and still had to fight it ! The back of the clamp had to open up so the bolt could go into the right place on the shaft. There was no easy way to do that while it was attached. If you doing this project, it might be worth it to just pull the steering shaft after the old pump is out, adjust it to fit the BOX... and then put it in.

WARNING- This gave my son plenty of time to mess around with the now disconnected steering wheel...which apparently turns many times in each direction. :thinking: So there's that... I'm going to have to see If I can find a way to get that steering wheel back where the Jeep thinks its straight. Not sure how the CPU figures it out... but it doesn't care about the hard parts being lined up.... It thinks I'm in a skid.... I might need to test that one turn at a time...

The other thing that hung me up for 40 min or so... is that it said there was a mark on the sector shaft (there actually was two). So I found it was impossible to line the first mark straight with the mark on the Box. It was a yellow dash across the bottom of the sector shaft (which was perpendicular to the top mark when the Box was at center). I then took the nut off the shaft and found the REAL mark to use for aligment :crazyeyes: Not PSC's fault... just mine trying to figure what on earth that other mark was!

I didn't have a wrench big enough for the Nut on the pitman arm... getting one from a friend... I had up to 1.5 inches... but the nut looks to be 1 inch and 9/16?

The New sector shaft is massive, the pitman arm is high quality... and I will give a test when I get it all working!

Glad it's all in, I won't get to test it until I sort out the steering stuff... which looks like it might be an adventure... I'm thinking I will disconnect the battery and then take the steering wheel cover off and see if there are any clues under there to line it back up... I'm also going to research if I have to shave a "reader" that will allow me to know how far out of adjustment it is? Maybe I can just clear codes and it will find the right spot... but somehow I think it's going to be one turn at a time until one of the settings doesn't bring up the Christmas lights.
Wow, this sounds like a difficult job. I want one but not sure I wanna take out my radiator. Wish someone would do a white up on this[emoji2]

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KYRubi

New member
Wow, this sounds like a difficult job. I want one but not sure I wanna take out my radiator. Wish someone would do a white up on this[emoji2]

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using WAYALIFE mobile app

Got it all put in... big heavy piece of equipment! I needed help to get the bolts in while holding it there.

Since I had a lot of projects, and the radiator was out while I worked... It really went simple! I imagine it would be very tight to work on with everything else in there.

But... the steering shaft (between the wheel and the box) gave me a couple hours worth of problems... I had to get it to "widen out" to fit on the shaft on the steering box. after fruitlessly trying to spread it out with a couple screwdrivers (now broken...lol) while it was still attached to the Jeep... I gave up and pulled it out, took it to the vice, used a big chisel to separate it and still had to fight it ! The back of the clamp had to open up so the bolt could go into the right place on the shaft. There was no easy way to do that while it was attached. If you doing this project, it might be worth it to just pull the steering shaft after the old pump is out, adjust it to fit the BOX... and then put it in.

WARNING- This gave my son plenty of time to mess around with the now disconnected steering wheel...which apparently turns many times in each direction. :thinking: So there's that... I'm going to have to see If I can find a way to get that steering wheel back where the Jeep thinks its straight. Not sure how the CPU figures it out... but it doesn't care about the hard parts being lined up.... It thinks I'm in a skid.... I might need to test that one turn at a time...

The other thing that hung me up for 40 min or so... is that it said there was a mark on the sector shaft (there actually was two). So I found it was impossible to line the first mark straight with the mark on the Box. It was a yellow dash across the bottom of the sector shaft (which was perpendicular to the top mark when the Box was at center). I then took the nut off the shaft and found the REAL mark to use for aligment :crazyeyes: Not PSC's fault... just mine trying to figure what on earth that other mark was!

I didn't have a wrench big enough for the Nut on the pitman arm... getting one from a friend... I had up to 1.5 inches... but the nut looks to be 1 inch and 9/16?

The New sector shaft is massive, the pitman arm is high quality... and I will give a test when I get it all working!

Glad it's all in, I won't get to test it until I sort out the steering stuff... which looks like it might be an adventure... I'm thinking I will disconnect the battery and then take the steering wheel cover off and see if there are any clues under there to line it back up... I'm also going to research if I have to shave a "reader" that will allow me to know how far out of adjustment it is? Maybe I can just clear codes and it will find the right spot... but somehow I think it's going to be one turn at a time until one of the settings doesn't bring up the Christmas lights.

Thanks for the write up and being an early adopter. I'm about 99% sure I'm going to go this route, but I'm waiting for some success stories before I pull the trigger. Have you gotten the Christmas lights to turn off yet? A friend of mine is having the same problem that is trying this upgrade.
 

AZ Explorer

Caught the Bug
WARNING- This gave my son plenty of time to mess around with the now disconnected steering wheel...which apparently turns many times in each direction. :thinking: So there's that... I'm going to have to see If I can find a way to get that steering wheel back where the Jeep thinks its straight. Not sure how the CPU figures it out... but it doesn't care about the hard parts being lined up.... It thinks I'm in a skid.... I might need to test that one turn at a time...

Glad it's all in, I won't get to test it until I sort out the steering stuff... which looks like it might be an adventure... I'm thinking I will disconnect the battery and then take the steering wheel cover off and see if there are any clues under there to line it back up... I'm also going to research if I have to shave a "reader" that will allow me to know how far out of adjustment it is? Maybe I can just clear codes and it will find the right spot... but somehow I think it's going to be one turn at a time until one of the settings doesn't bring up the Christmas lights.

Hopefully this wasn't the problem for you (saw you got it fixed). I installed a body lift on a 97 f150 back in the day and with those you add a steering shaft spacer. While it was disconnected my young nephew spun the wheel and afterwards I has a bunch of problems. It turned out that it wasn't a wheel centering thing but had in fact destroyed the clock spring and I had to replace it. No kids "helping" ever since.

How is the box performing?
 
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sunnysideup

Active Member
2017 Sunlight basin 040.jpg
Hopefully this wasn't the problem for you (saw you got it fixed). I installed a body lift on a 97 f150 back in the day and with those you add a steering shaft spacer. While it was disconnected my young nephew spun the wheel and afterwards I has a bunch of problems. It turned out that it wasn't a wheel centering thing but had in fact destroyed the clock spring and I had to replace it. No kids "helping" ever since.

How is the box performing?

I finally got it out for a couple of long trips... a 500 miles round trip... 160 miles on one lane gravel.... at speeds around 50. The box performed great! Most of the highway I was on...was also terrible... spring roads in north central MT in the spring...

Then this last Monday, I was able to put some minor trail time on the box... and another 400 on the highway.

My impression is that it is very tight, works great, and will soon be tested in deep wet spring snow and mud. It has over 1200 miles on it now... just works great. I have not taken the jump to 37's yet... so this is still with 35's ... but I'll update when I go bigger.

The fish trip was great. 2017 Fort Peck trip 038.jpg

The Mountain trip was.. well snowy. 2017 Sunlight basin 087.jpg

The box is good!
 
View attachment 261407

I finally got it out for a couple of long trips... a 500 miles round trip... 160 miles on one lane gravel.... at speeds around 50. The box performed great! Most of the highway I was on...was also terrible... spring roads in north central MT in the spring...

Then this last Monday, I was able to put some minor trail time on the box... and another 400 on the highway.

My impression is that it is very tight, works great, and will soon be tested in deep wet spring snow and mud. It has over 1200 miles on it now... just works great. I have not taken the jump to 37's yet... so this is still with 35's ... but I'll update when I go bigger.

The fish trip was great. View attachment 261405

The Mountain trip was.. well snowy. View attachment 261406

The box is good!

Upgrade any other components like the hoses or just a direct swap?

Thanks
 

sunnysideup

Active Member
I upgraded to Rancho Knuckles.... I am running synergy drag link flip.... A metalcloak track bar. Stock hoses... amsoil power steering fluid. I have a pretty new mopar power steering pump a s well.
 

tippedover

Member
Didn't see the answer so hope I am not over looking my question.
When installing this is their anything else you need besides the part? And is the install something that the everyday guy can do at home (i.e. Me who doesn't have a lot a whole lol experience)


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sunnysideup

Active Member
Running it with 37's now. No problem and it drives with two fingers on the highway... unless it is like 40mph winds... then I need a full paw on the wheel.

So... no leaking, no adverse effects on pump or steering components. Submerged it with water over the tires... it did fine. It doesn't feel much different than stock on the road. It does not refuse to turn the tires when backing my trailer up, where the old box and pump would sometimes have issues when pushing the trailer uphill and backwards.

I would buy it again, I don't regret not getting a ram assist at this point. 90% of my driving is on pavement. It doesn't have any issues at this point!
 

sunnysideup

Active Member
Didn't see the answer so hope I am not over looking my question.
When installing this is their anything else you need besides the part? And is the install something that the everyday guy can do at home (i.e. Me who doesn't have a lot a whole lol experience)


Sent from my iPhone using WAYALIFE mobile app

You don't need to replace anything else than this part. Hardest part is getting pitman arm off- and you will need a second person to line up the holes when mounting the box to the frame. I could not hold it in place and line up the bolts... but an extra set of hands did it fine. I used no special tools.... no power tools... so I would say it is a pretty easy part swap.
 
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