Quick question on power steering

[Nutro]

I think you guys are right! I noticed the missing belt when I was taking the pics but didn't think it was needed. I thought it was odd. I bought the truck and drove it home an hour. Didn't make any noises or act odd then I started it the next day and it was making odd noises. Maybe I threw the belt on the way home? So I need a new PS belt

 

[Wes Harden]

The ac belts just doesn't have enough contact to turn the pump well. When belt is new it will grab ok, As the belt slips it will get polished and hard, then will slip all the time. the 2nd belt only for p/s pump and water pump has much more contact and much harder to slip.
I think the engineers just used the double pulley so they didn't have to move the ac compressor or P/s pump.

 

[frankin5]

The missing belt this on the first position on the crank goes to the AC to the back position on the power steering to the crank. The next belt out goes to the water pump, outer position on power and back to the crank. You need two new belts.

 

[Wes Harden]

yeah I couldn't tell for sure, in pictures posted it looked like the a/c lines up well with front. My 77 a/c is the back grove and p/s water pump the front.

 

[Nutro]

Man, I feel like an idiot. Thanks for catching that! I'm still going to do the Serpentine conversion hopefully but haven't been driving the truck because of the noisy PS. I just ordered the belts on Amazon

 

[6872xtc]

It looks to me like that back groove on the power steering pulley is rusty. I doubt that you lost the belt on the way home.

 

[Blue85]

The pumps themselves are all the same, but the reservoirs changed according to the mounting brackets. It's also easy to swap the pulley from one to another (free loaner tools available). So parts can be mixed and matched to get a good pump that bolts in, if you can't find what you need or don't want to wait.

As said above, the inner belt is more valuable than the outer one since it has more wrap on the pulley. You just have to tighten the PS first, and then the A/C, but that's not a problem since you'll have to loosen them all anyway to install the belt.

 

[Nutro]

Well dang. I went ahead and bought new belts today at Advance Auto. Got them all installed and fired it up. Still whines pretty bad. I bet the pump is bad from not being fully used? Any chance I can adjust the steering box to stop that whine or is it usually the pump?

 

[Wes Harden]

Add an oz of limited slip friction modifier. If it doesn't quite down yeah the pump is damaged