[nytrainer]

So my son decided he wants a fast ratio steering box on his 68 vert. He can have one built and the person building it will sell him one outright or he can return his OEM box after swapping (he doesn’t want to lay up the car while waiting for shipping on both ends and the mod/rebuilding of his box). The builder charges $150 as a core charge (refunded after it’s returned) or he can keep his OEM box but loses the $150. It would cost roughly $40 to ship it back so really it will cost him $110 to keep it. The box works perfectly and I also have a 68 vert that it would be date correct if I ever needed it I suppose.
Is it worth keeping and/or would he at least be able to sell it for the $110 he would be paying to keep it if need be? I tend to hold onto parts that I might potentially use.
Thanks.

[64speed]

If he has plans to keep the car in perpetuity then I would either have the factory box built for appearance sake or put it up for later use. Since I have been doing this Tempest I am here to tell you it ain’t like it was 20 or even 10 years ago. Everything comes from a specialty manufacturer now. My 58 delray has the factory power steering which is really just a control assist and a ram cylinder attached to the drag link. I bought my rebuilt units at autozone in 1999 right from the computer without having to even go in a paper catalog. Lifetime warranty on both. The control valve went out two years ago and after an hour of phone calls and catalog swapping the manager refunded my money and let me keep the part to have rebuilt because they couldn’t honor the warranty. In fact I remember when we kept 58-64 center support bearings on the shelf!