[Squidward]

Greg, that was cool. I have thought about that since I have seen rebuilt pumps sold without the reservoir.

Nick, I went through a very similar situation. I bought new pump from Oreilly's to go on my 72 Lemans during engine rebuild. Steering box was original.

After engine break in I hooked up PS with new hoses, etc. and it worked great. Only problem was a very significant steering box leak. So I replaced steering box with Oreilly unit.

Result? No PS assist, and with a new pump that had less than a few miles of neighborhood testing, working fine on the old leaky box. I figured it must be a crappy new box. Back to the store for warranty return on box.

Result? No PS assist. Now I was mad because steering boxes aren't a cakewalk to RnR. Since my back was already sore, I decided to go with PS pump warranty replacement. It seemed like the less painful option instead of assuming a failure mode of 2 bad boxes.

Result? PS works great, no leaks. I have to guess that some piece of crap dislodged between old box and new box install and fouled up the pump.

I don't have a problem with Oreilly's. Stuff like ps pumps, alternators, starters, etc. will go bad, but I like the quick hit with the warranty return. I'm pretty good at the PS box swap now, but I would prefer to never deal with it again.