00 Grease in 2000 Power Steering Pump

Tractor is a 64 Ford 2000, but has been converted to a 172 cid engine.

I installed a zerk on the steering box to fill the box with 00 grease after it started leaking around the ends of the sector shafts and down the pitman arms. After 2 containers (2 quarts total) and no grease coming out of the top of the steering column I decided to let it be for now until I could get another container from my local TSC. Today, I was walking around the front of the tractor and noticed power steering fluid on top of the reservoir and on the ground. I opened the reservoir and fluid gushed out and then I saw what appeared to be the 00 grease mixed in the reservoir with the PS fluid.

My question is, is there a seal between the PS control valve and the steering column or the steering box that has failed or is there something else I should be looking for?

The steering feels tight after I adjusted the sector shafts (and before this mess) but the column does raise and lower as the wheel is turned.

If I need to overhaul the steering (seals, bearings, etc) I will plan on replacing common-to-fail consumable parts as well as any I find to be in poor shape. Any recommendations on what to replace outside of things I find in poor shape?

I am going to pick up an FO20 manual tomorrow so if there is anything in there you would recommend to look at I would be interested.
 
Yes there is a seal between control valve section and gear section. The seal keeps p/s oil out of gear section not other way around.
 
"but the column does raise and lower as the wheel is turned. "

That sounds like bad bearings too. In for a penny, in for a pound.
Its not that bad a job. The folks here helped my do my first one
a couple years ago. Make sure you get the right parts the first time.
Some websites list the same bearings/seals for manual and PS
gear boxes but they are not the same. Use the parts list on the
CNH site or Messicks which links to it to get the numbers.
 
(quoted from post at 00:31:48 02/16/18) Yes there is a seal between control valve section and gear section. The seal keeps p/s oil out of gear section not other way around.

I'm wondering what the possible cause then could be for the appearance of the grease in the reservoir. I could quite easily be wrong, but the only fluid change the tractor has had has been the grease I pumped into the steering box, and what was in the reservoir was similar in appearance.
 
If the lower seal below the control valve has failed and there's nowhere else for the grease to go that you pumped in, then it most likely ended up inside the control valve and then got pumped through the power steering system until it ended up in the reservoir.
 

I was wondering if that was possibly what happened. If the steering column seals/bearings were still in good shape and the seal under the control valve was damaged some how, would that explain why the grease was not able to come up through the steering column and out the top?
 
The seal in the bottom of the hydraulic control valve is not going to stop any grease from the bottom gear housing. The fill plug is the limit. Your idea of filling it full of OO grease till it shows at the top of the steering column is not correct for power steering equipt tractors. You will fill the hydraulic control valve first,(as you found out) and that Power Steering pump is not going to pump OO grease.
 
The steering wheel on a PS equipped tractor is supposed to rise and fall as it's turned. About 3/32" or so.
And if you think about that system that lower seal is made to keep pressure in on the top side of the seal - not the bottom side.
So it wouldn't take much pressure to push the grease past it and fill the reservoir.
Its kind of a funny incident actually but I doubt you hurt anything by doing it.
As said, flush the grease out and youll probably be ok.
 

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