Cgalpha08's build

[cgalpha08]

It's crazy how much bigger they are. But I said that when I first got my H3 and went from 33's to 35's then to 37's. Now I feel inadequate again.

I didn't think it would be that different. I was wrong lol. The proportions look way better as well.

 

[alrock]

Meh, it's a poser truck. I'd have to see it in action in Sand Hollow next month to believe this isn't all AI generated stuff

(Okay, it looks GREAT but you should still pivot and come out next month!)

 

[cgalpha08]

With a growing family. I had to remove the rear platform i made a few years ago and reinstall the rear seats. Well that means I had to find new locations for a few things, in this instance the fire extinguisher. I picked up a set of the badlands industries seat riser molle panels and bolted my fire extinguisher to it.

I also had my gmrs radio mounted on the platform, ill more than likely move that to under the dash at some point in the future.

 

[cgalpha08]

Added an anti-wrap bar. With the 40s its needed.

 

[cgalpha08]

Went to windrock with the hummer club. Got some damage. Passenger mirror, gone. Fenders popping off. Both passenger doors dented and scraped

 

[06 H3]

Welcome to the body damage club. Do you plan to get her fixed up and all pretty again?

 

[H3Hummer]

Well those who don't wheel never got any kind of damage , right? Nice Pictures ,I'm sure your rig is gonna be like new .........soon

 

[cgalpha08]

Welcome to the body damage club. Do you plan to get her fixed up and all pretty again?

So i think my official plan is this. Pull the dent out to get the fender to seat, and clear coat the baremetal so it doesnt rust. Then this winter take it to a body shop and have them fix the doors. I know most people will say to just leave it, but these doors are very very nice, they only have 45k on them and besides the outer skin, are near perfect, so i would like to keep them close to that. The fenders, are plastic and i dont really care as much about them.

I have a second set of doors, which were originally destined for half doors, but i've only gotten around to the drivers door. So i think in the future i will put the crappy second set of doors on and beat them up and then use the nice set for on road driving. The mirror ill just replace asap. The problem with the midwest and east coast, i cant just put half doors on for wheeling all the time, too much mud and other crud.

 

[cgalpha08]

Snagged a set of mirrors for $50, and another pass mirror for $20.
Did some surgery on the mirror cap since its all nice and line-xed and I wanted to re-use it.

 

[cgalpha08]

Some more pics from windrock.

 

[H3Hummer]

Love those H3's with SAS, some monsters out there. Man I whish I could do the same here but it would never be street legal again We are way to strict over here to let guys modify a truck like this, even, if it's done by a pro with all the parts tickets you had to buy and so....no way ....

 

[06 H3]

Love those H3's with SAS, some monsters out there. Man I whish I could do the same here but it would never be street legal again We are way to strict over here to let guys modify a truck like this, even, if it's done by a pro with all the parts tickets you had to buy and so....no way ....

We are headed in the same direction….bunch of commies trying to ruin this country

 

[H3Hummer]

Over here in EU, they fuck you up even when you lightly build up a rig, the tec inspection, aggregation area , they want every paper proving that the stuff you've added is legal made for your rig and checked by an sated autorise aggregation compagnie ( we have like TüV , DEKRA and 2 more only!!!)
example: You change tires or wheels: TüV papers please .... and the costs to put the mods legal

 

[cgalpha08]

Well time for the next mod. I was doing an oil change and noticed the power steering was leaking by the cooler. Followed it up and its coming from the reservoir return fitting.
On the factory reservoir its a plastic nipple with a hose barb. This is the second time I've had a leak there. Due to the sas the factory ps reservoir sits very close to the steering box. Frame flex and engine torque cause them to hit. When I replaced it with a factory unit before, I spaced the steering box off of the frame by another 1/4 inch. I guess this wasnt enough, and perhaps having even more flex in the front allowed it to hit even more.

Anyway, a few years ago I had bought a bunch of parts to do an aftermarket pump/reservoir to eliminate this issue, better flow, more fluid, etc. I never got around to it, and quite frankly wasnt going to do it until i had another issue. Well here we are.

This is all PSC stuff, cbr pump, resevoir, Goatbuilt relocation bracket, fragola lines. I'll admit im on the fence about the psc pump, reviews are mixed, so hopefully I don't piss through pumps alot. Ill be working on this over the winter.

 

[cgalpha08]

The other night I got the old accessory bracket and pump/reservoir out and mocked up the new bracket system.

Old:

New bracket from goatbuilt:

 

[rascole]

What does that bracket give you over the old?

 

[cgalpha08]

What does that bracket give you over the old?

So this will allow me to run an aftermarket pump.
In this case a psc cbr style pump, but you can also get the spacing for a tc style pump.

The oem pump/resevoir combo is discontinued and hard to find good ones these days, so i went looking for a solution.

Im sure you can modify the oem bracket somehow to get the correct spacing and mounting for a different style pump, I juat didnt want to bother figuring all of that out.

Aftermarket pump also has more pressure /flow than stock, and will allow me to run a remote resvoir. The system will have more fluid now and hopefully work a little better at low rpm.

Idk what pump you're planning on using with your new ls, but they make accessory brackets to basically run whatever you want based on truck/f body spacing etc.

This will also mitigate the oem reservoir hitting the steering box when the frame flexes, which i had spaced the steering box off of the frame some but I guess its still hitting. Or the hose clamp had worked itself loose. It was leaking where the return line goes into the reservoir.

Needless to say I've been meaning to do this for a long time, and the latest leak gave me justification as I was going to have to tear the whole thing apart anyway.

 

[rascole]

Was going to ask what clearance problems there are with truck-style pumps and reservoirs?

 

[cgalpha08]

Was going to ask what clearance problems there are with truck-style pumps and reservoirs?

I think the factory gmt900 series pumps probably clear. The oem alpha had a much wider pump/reservoir combo. I dont see any issue with running one of those assuming it fits.

 

[Schwarttzy]

Interesting...

 

[06 H3]

I was pretty sure PSC P pumps and TC pumps fit the factory bracket. The p pump was on earlier gen LS truck motors and the TC pump was on later style LS motors from the factory.

I have a TC pump from radial dynamics in the box waiting to go in. I’ll report back if it fits once I get my steering done

 

[cgalpha08]

I was pretty sure PSC P pumps and TC pumps fit the factory bracket. The p pump was on earlier gen LS truck motors and the TC pump was on later style LS motors from the factory.

I have a TC pump from radial dynamics in the box waiting to go in. I’ll report back if it fits once I get my steering done

im almost positive you're right. when i was looking into this years ago, i remember reading a thread on ih8mud where they put a tc or camaro pump on a trailblazer bracket, which looked eerily like ours. IIRC he got it to work with some spacing. i eventually decided i didn't want to mess with that and wanted to make sure my pulleys lined up.

Chris, i think the TC pumps have the bolt pass through, the housing of the pump, vs oem the bolt goes straight into the pump housing itself. Not that big of an issue, as you could just a get a longer bolt. I am curious if the TC pump will put the pulley in the correct spot on your stock alpha bracket.

To be honest, I cant remember why i chose the CBR over the TC pump 3.5 years ago. hadn't even heard of radial dynamics at the time and probably would have gone that route.

 

[06 H3]

CBR flows more per 1 revolution of the pump compared to a TC pump.

The P pump flows the most (for reasonably acquired pumps) per 1 revolution but also are the most sensitive to abuse.

The TC pump flows the least per 1 revolution but can handle abuse the best. You can throw a smaller pulley on it to get it to spin faster at idle and it will probably handle the added speed fine.

The CBR is based off the TC and flows more per revolution but doesn’t have the added bearing up front like the TC does to handle the added abuse.

The CBR is in the middle for the abuse it can handle, better then the p pump, worse then the TC but flows more then the TC, less then the p pump.

I went down this rabbit hole when trying to figure out my steering, if I was keeping my steering box powered with a 2.5in ram I needed massive amount of low end flow which the TC pump lacked…what I really needed was a “trophy truck” pump which was based off the N pump, a very old, rare, hard to come by pump. They flowed massive amounts of fluid per 1 revolution of the pump but had the downsides of the P pump for longevity and abuse. So manufacturers took the guts of the N pump and put them in billet housings and used bearing setups like the tc pump. It’s the best of all worlds and trophy trucks use them, hence the nickname but they are also like $1500 for a damn pump, so I decided to depower the steering box, and just run power through the ram, and have the box follow along for moral support and road manners.

Lastly, low end flow is the biggest concern, once you spin the pump at 2500-3000 rpm all the pumps are flowing enough to be using the bypass valve and it is bypassing fluid because too much fluid causes a twitchy feel, but in crawling we live in a world near idle so having the flow at idle matters the most.

Flow dictates speed of steering.
Pressure dictates power.

Now, there are faster and slower steering boxes which play into speed as well. Also pitman arm to steering arm ratios play into speed too.

Bombing around the hammer trails in the rocks I felt the speed was lacking. Dodging and climbing rocks at faster than a crawl I couldn’t turn the box fast enough. My pitman arm to steering arm ratio was slow, the xterra box is 3.25 or 3.75 turn (off of memory) which is on the slower end, and my pump was stock.

I changed my arm ratio, have a 2.5 turn WJ box which the 2.5 turn guts fit in an Xterra box, and I have a radial dynamics TC pump with a smaller pulley.

Now guys racing use 1-1.5 turn lock to lock steering, great for dodging shit at 80 mph, but the faster the steering the more twitchy it feels so I figure 2.5 turn is a happy medium. Keeps decent feel (and OEMs use 2.5 turn like a WJ) so it’s still on the oem spectrum but the quicker end of it.

 

[Schwarttzy]

@cgalpha08 I'm working on solutions for the lack of power steering pump replacements for the H3 Hummer Alpha would like the pump for testing if it's available because I found this https://www.ebay.com/itm/227094389191 which might enable Alpha owns chance at resealing the pump.

 

[cgalpha08]

Here is a comparison of the two brackets.
You can see the alternator is in the same location, but the pump is higher up.
I also confirmed, you can infact mount the cbr pump on the oem bracket. The pulley spacing is the same between the oem pump and the cbr pump.