Roland-

I finished the installation of the power steering kit on my Ford 861 yesterday, and it works perfectly.  I spent quite a lot of time on it, mostly because I am a slow worker and spend a lot of time finding misplaced tools, backing out of mistakes, etc.  I also spent some time planning the installation so that I would be satisfied with it after it was done, and dealt with a number of other issues while I had the tractor apart.  After it was done, I felt the results are worth all the trouble.  I appears that I will have to do something about my hydraulic pump eventually, since it probably isn’t putting out its rated flow.  At idle, there is barely enough excess flow to lift the bucket.  At operating speed, the loader is slower than it was, but sufficient for now.

I’ve attached some pictures in case you are interested.  The picture of the whole tractor was taken some time before I started putting on the power steering, and the others show how I ended up mounting the flow controller.  The flow controller is mounted on a platform that was added by a previous owner for a control valve to control implements.  I T’d into the tank port from the loader controls to accommodate the return from the flow controller and the steering control, which made use of the existing filter.  I replaced the cartridge with a 20 micron version of the standard cartridge, although the supplied cartridge will also fit.  The rest is standard stuff I imagine.  One thing I have not done is to bolt the rear of the cowling to the steering controller mounting bracket on each side.  The cowling seems secure enough as it is, and I would rather not drill for the bolts, but the cowling did originally bolt to the steering box assembly.  Do other customers do this, and do you think it is necessary?

I came to appreciate the engineering you put into the system, as all the parts fit and the steering action couldn’t be better.  I hope to get a lot of use out of it for the next couple of decades.

Thanks,

Norm Kolb