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rack and pinion????


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May sound silly but has anyone considered...

 

Getting one with a longer shaft, but a shorter body?

You could then mess with the shaft length by making shaft covers that would be welded into place to get the desired length?...

 

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It may be worth looking into.... then you may find that the Mustang 2 reacks are alot more appealing... they may be too short as is, but some hollow .120 wall tubing and a welder later... they are the perfect fit....

And yes it would be a very near exact science... but one could also tap/die the shaft, and the tubing and have it adjustable with lock nuts just like the standard steering toe adjustment...

 

Just throwing out the idea...

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so, if the pivot points of the control arms measure 24" then the pivot  points of the rack should be about equal to reduce bump steer?

 

glad to see another ford fan.  much props on that.

i looked over your website and thats a pretty sweet ride.  we could have told you to leave the factory wire harness in place tho, it is a nasty mess as you learned.

whats the chance you could get us more detailed pics of the rack setup itself?

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hopefully this year I'll get some time to do some experimenting myself.

 

This past fall I went to a bone yard and measured all kinds of racks.  There are a few that are approx. 22" inner to inner.

 

My thoughts were if you can position the rack where the inner tie rods are located and travel in the same location that the original center link does, you should not have much problem with bumpsteer.  I still have to lay it out and plot the center link travel.  The pitman arm and idler arm travel in a circle so at max left and right steering the center link will actualy be in a different location than when the steering is straight ahead.

 

Not only are the inner tie rod centers important, but so is the location of the rack unit.  

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The bumpsteer problem is solved. I just had to keep spacing the tie rod ends lower and lower (about 2") until the thing started to respond favorably (less than .060 toe-out at full bump) the next problem is gonna be the wheel interferance. Even though i had custom centerlines made for the car, the front wheels still measure 16x7 w/ 5" bs. That should be the same as the factory wheels. I will add an 1/8th in spacer to move the wheel out off of the caliper to see if this remedies the clearance issue. If not, I'll either have to heat the tie rod end on the spindle and move it in ,or cut it off and fabricate it in a relocated position. I will definantly take a barrage of photos tommorrow if this works and update the web site, as it also will detail what you'll have to do to get the steering to couple to the rack.
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