Electric Power Steering Questions

[F500guy]

All,
I had a couple questions if anyone on the forum went down this path and the results or pictures. Before I firm up my order with FF, I am again re-think plan A. I do not want a hydraulic pump on the front of the motor and originally was going to go with the EPS unit from 520 Speeworks. I saw the video of there install, and was concerned with that in a track or auto cross situation, would need a better bracket. But on the 30k review of the car, they did not have the EPS system on the car and it was back to standard hydraulic power steering, not sure why. I found a couple other sources,

1) One that was for a MK3 and in dash install
2) one that I can put a speed sensor (simple Hall effect pulse type) on and calibrate to reduce the force at speed, looked pretty good, nice control box and manual over ride knob and would have to locate and build my own bracket in the engine bay X2 cost of the 520 unit.
3) Also found a few electric hydraulic units, looks like could mount pretty easy and connect to standard hydraulic rack, again x2 the 520 speedworks cost.

I want to get the caster angle up with out "armstrong steering" of a completely manual rack, but looking outside the normal box for options.

[Just 1 More]

Have you looked at any of the EPAS systems? I'm using the microsteer unit on my FFR33. They have one specifically for the FFR Cobra https://epasperformance.com/collecti...-5-mkiii-cobra

[Just 1 More]

https://www.dcemotorsport.com/Home/EPAS#MIDI

[JIMOCO]

I went with this. https://epowersteering.com/purchase/...4-roadster-kit
I was able to keep my manual rack and convert to PS. Installation requires cutting the steering column, mounting the unit and running the electric. It has been two years since installation and I am very pleased. Steering assist is great and can be adjusted from full assist to no assist. After installation, I was able to adjust caster by several degrees which greatly reduced/eliminated the twitchy feel at highway speeds. Very good system. I do not have pictures but they have an installation video on the site. They have great service and can send you pictures and instructions for you to review.

[F500guy]

I have been looking at all of them that were listed. The Epowersteering is what 520 sells, can anyone tell me if it has a speed/torque/position feedback as part of it? That one I think would need better mounting If i track or auto cross.

DCE Micro Steer looks good with the speed sensor version. Will not have any ECU so can not use can bus inputs, also available at flaming river

Epas has the MK3 underdash if it would fit would be great.

The Electric Hydraulic pump pulls a lot of amps...Bosch makes one for a Mini.

Continue any good/bad/ugly feed back, I have at least 2 months before I confirm my order and decide on the rack I need.

[toadster]

I went with this. https://epowersteering.com/purchase/...4-roadster-kit
I was able to keep my manual rack and convert to PS. Installation requires cutting the steering column, mounting the unit and running the electric. It has been two years since installation and I am very pleased. Steering assist is great and can be adjusted from full assist to no assist. After installation, I was able to adjust caster by several degrees which greatly reduced/eliminated the twitchy feel at highway speeds. Very good system. I do not have pictures but they have an installation video on the site. They have great service and can send you pictures and instructions for you to review.

just a note, you cannot use the epowersteering kit with a coyote, the engine is just too wide - ask me how I know

[F500guy]

just a note, you cannot use the epowersteering kit with a coyote, the engine is just too wide - ask me how I know

I am using a 427 SBF from BPE.

[Nigel Allen]

just a note, you cannot use the epowersteering kit with a coyote, the engine is just too wide - ask me how I know

I did. I mounted the EPAS up against the engine side of the firewall as a replacement for the lower bearing on the steering shaft. It involved making a bracket and I welded the EPAS female splined input adaptor onto the upper steering shaft. it works perfectly.

It works perfectly. Keep in mind that I have RHD, but I still think it possible for LHD.

My only regret is not doing it before the body went on. It was tight getting my hands in past the fat heads of the Coyote.

I can try and get pics if anyone wants them. I tried unsuccessfully to take pics previously. There is too many things in the way (I mounted my ECU directly above) and the lighting was poor. Happy to try and take some in anyone really wants them.

Cheers,

Nige

[runamuk]

I went with this. https://epowersteering.com/purchase/...4-roadster-kit
I was able to keep my manual rack and convert to PS. Installation requires cutting the steering column, mounting the unit and running the electric. It has been two years since installation and I am very pleased. Steering assist is great and can be adjusted from full assist to no assist. After installation, I was able to adjust caster by several degrees which greatly reduced/eliminated the twitchy feel at highway speeds. Very good system. I do not have pictures but they have an installation video on the site. They have great service and can send you pictures and instructions for you to review.

I went with this system also, very easy to install.

[narly1]

For the budget conscious, there's lots of info online from the restomod community regarding modding/repurposing the Toyota Prius and (I think) Saturn Vue EPAS units for other applications.

Earl

[CraigS]

I definitely like the idea of speed sensitive PS like most modern cars have. But, on an FFR install, be careful of what they will use for a speed sensor. Some transmissions have a speed sensor but what type signal does it provide? Some of the speedometers use a GPS signal but same question. What type signal does the EPS need?

[Kbl7td]

The Saturn VUE unit with controller can be had for less than $250. Uses GPS sensor for input control. Motor is a little large though.

[Madfor67]

Ebay seller from Portugal offers 3 different types of EPS control unit. 1. Manual dial type, 2. Feedback type (it assists depending on the torque you input into the steering wheel), 3. GPS speed sensor type. Pick your poison.

I have a Coyote engine, so those kits won't work for me. So, I bought a Saturn Vue EPS from Ebay for $110. I plan to fabricate a strong bracket so that I can mount it in between the firewall and the dashboard (closer to the dashboard). I have some pictures from someone who has done it.

[Nigel Allen]

I set the potentiometer about 1/16 of a turn clockwise. That was a couple of years ago. Haven't needed to touch since, despite all kinds of on road driving.

About the only frustrating thing is if you turn the ignition off and then back on again within a few seconds the epas stops working. It seems you have to have the ignition off for at least 10 seconds.

HTH, nige

[retiredinalabama]

I did. I mounted the EPAS up against the engine side of the firewall as a replacement for the lower bearing on the steering shaft. It involved making a bracket and I welded the EPAS female splined input adaptor onto the upper steering shaft. it works perfectly.

It works perfectly. Keep in mind that I have RHD, but I still think it possible for LHD.

My only regret is not doing it before the body went on. It was tight getting my hands in past the fat heads of the Coyote.

I can try and get pics if anyone wants them. I tried unsuccessfully to take pics previously. There is too many things in the way (I mounted my ECU directly above) and the lighting was poor. Happy to try and take some in anyone really wants them.

Cheers,

Nige

Nige, would you mind sharing some pictures? I just ordered my EPAS and like the idea of mounting it up on the firewall. It sounds like a cleaner looking install.

[Rdone585]

Nige, if turning off if the ignition for less than 10 sec, is an issue you want to resolve electrically... there is a solution. It's called a one-shot-timer. It's a little device you can wire so that a pulse of a defined length is output based on a trigger input. The trigger input would be ignition turning off, the output could be programmed to be an output pulse of 10 sec. If interested, search for one-shot-timer circuit design.

Edit: To add another solution, you could put a simple RC filter so that short ignition ON-OFF-ON times would be essentially ignored because they are filtered out. Selection of the resistor capacitor would determine how much ON-OFF-ON time would be ignored.

[Nigel Allen]

Nige, if turning off if the ignition for less than 10 sec, is an issue you want to resolve electrically... there is a solution. It's called a one-shot-timer. It's a little device you can wire so that a pulse of a defined length is output based on a trigger input. The trigger input would be ignition turning off, the output could be programmed to be an output pulse of 10 sec. If interested, search for one-shot-timer circuit design.

Edit: To add another solution, you could put a simple RC filter so that short ignition ON-OFF-ON times would be essentially ignored because they are filtered out. Selection of the resistor capacitor would determine how much ON-OFF-ON time would be ignored.

Thanks R,

Agreed, I reckon a delay off timer is a good solution. I would probably set it to 30 seconds. That way if I ever have to shut the engine off whilst in motion, my power steer would remain active until until I can bring the car to a stop. Killing two birds with one stone I reckon.

Cheers,

Nigel

[Nigel Allen]

Nige, would you mind sharing some pictures? I just ordered my EPAS and like the idea of mounting it up on the firewall. It sounds like a cleaner looking install.

Here is my original write up for fitting electric power assist system (EPAS) to RHD drive roadster:

At the time when I purchased My roadster kit in 2011, power steering wasn't available from FFR for right-hand drive. As such, my kit came supplied with a manual rack. Whilst it worked okay, I was never really happy with it, as steering was quite heavy and sluggish. I could have replaced it with a hydraulic rack option available locally but it was very pricey. Additionally, I would have to fit a pump to the Coyote. I was out to $5k even before hoses and a cooler. Thanks to the feedback on this forum from other members who have fitted EPAS their cars I decided to take the plunge.
I chose the Epowersteering kit as used by others. Ordering it was the easy part, making it fit was a little trickier. As the corpulent Coyote takes up a lot of the real estate in the engine bay, my only choice was to mount the EPAS on the driver side foot box. Fortunately, FFR had sent me two steering shafts assemblies with my kit. This meant I did not have to hack up the original assembly. This gave me the confidence that I could revert back to manual steering if it didn’t work out.
My preference was to use only 2 universal joints in the steering system to eliminate as much 'play' in the steering as possible. I acheived this by connecting the shaft from the steering wheel boss to the EPAS without unit joints.
Steps:
1. Removed the lower steering bearing from the firewall - no longer required. (See red arrow)
2. Cut the upper universal joint off of the steering shaft assembly and replaced it with the splined adaptor that was supplied with the power steer kit.
3. I then fabbed up an angled bracket to mount the EPAS to the foot box. It was a bit of work to get the angles correct, which is very important to prevent binding through misalignment, but I got there in the end.

Picture1.jpg

4. This bracket was then bolted using M6 cap head screws (blue arrows) to the ~6mm steel plate that normally supports the lower steering shaft bearing. With everything all lined up, I could now rotate the steering wheel and see the output shaft on the EPAS rotate. All nice and smooth without binding. Happy days

Picture1.png



By a stroke of luck, I located a lower steering shaft complete with universals that was an exact fit, to connect between the EPAS output and the steering rack. An added bonus was that the universals were more robust than FFR supplied. I had already experienced wear on the original universals that made for slop in the steering. A bit poor for 3,500 miles (I suspect the wear was exacerbated by the extra force I had to apply with manual steer, or maybe just faulty from new. Either way, glad to see it gone).
All that was left to do was to wire it up which was pretty straightforward other than having to extend the cabling from the control box to the potentiometer that controls the level of assistance.
Once everything was buttoned up, I took it for a test drive. Gingerly at first but then for a good blast on some windy roads in the hills. I have to say that the car is absolutely transformed. I certainly wish I had done this from the get-go. Tracking and overall drivability is now hugely improved.

Cheers,

Nigel

[Benchwarmer]

Ebay seller from Portugal offers 3 different types of EPS control unit. 1. Manual dial type, 2. Feedback type (it assists depending on the torque you input into the steering wheel), 3. GPS speed sensor type. Pick your poison.

I have a Coyote engine, so those kits won't work for me. So, I bought a Saturn Vue EPS from Ebay for $110. I plan to fabricate a strong bracket so that I can mount it in between the firewall and the dashboard (closer to the dashboard). I have some pictures from someone who has done it.

Do you mind sharing pics?