I have been looking to put power steering in my 53 sedan while I have it stripped down. I decided to call Rack and Pinion warehouse and ask them for some ***istance on a power rack for the car I talked to the tech gave him the specs 48.5" OT to OT and 27" inner frame rail to inner frame rail and straight steering column shaft he called me back 10 ten minutes later and said 1988-1996 buick regal will fit right in so now when it comes in on tuesday weld on the brackets get the outer tierods and I will have power steering. all for 125.97. 65 for the R&P 45 for Core and 12 shipping. Thought I would share this oh yeh this is with the stock crossmember and front end. I had though about going with mustang IFS and R&P but the Mustang II was smaller car and alot lighter I know alot of people have successs with these but I was worried it may be to much stress on the front end and steering so I went this route instead.
I would like to see some pics when you start the installation. I have a 52 pontiac that I think would benefit from an R & P setup.
Sounds interesting. I have a 1950 chevy I would be interested in adding power steering to. Keep us up to date.
will do. it will probably next week the rack should get to me tuesday. sorry guys i edited the post I have a 53 chevy i did not put the year in before. had to go back and edit.
you gave the wrong specs. the width of the frame has little to do with it. the pivot point on the rack needs to be the same width as where the A-Arms pivot otherwise you will get bump steer as the A-Arm and rack "tie rods" (?) will be pivoting on a different arc. I'd suggest cancelling your order asap. as for the mustang II being on a light car... the total weight of the car does not matter but rather the weight over the front wheels. MII has the motor right on top of the crossmember where your chevy it will be a little more behind thereby putting less weight on the front end. 49-54's use 4 cylinder mustang springs rather than 6 or 8. that should tell you something right there. MII ball joints are actually bigger than a Camaro. last but not least... if there were a viable rack and pinion for stock 49-54's alll the aftermarket guys would be selling a kit and rolling in the dough.
ok thanks for the info rat fink , the width of the frame was only to make sure the rack it self was not to wide the tech really did not care about that except to see if we could fit the rack itself into the frame rails the outer tie rod to outer tierod measurement was the main concern behind the length. if you have a MII ifs I was not downing it I was just concerned and did not know alot about them. I am going to try it with the buick one and see how it goes. hey you never know until you try.
Those who have tried said to not do it. The problem is the crazy long stock tie rods, they are that way because of the long control arms. draw an imaginary line along the lower control arm inboard mounts. where they intersect the steering is supposed to be the inner tie rod. steering racks mount it too far out. This causes bump steer. Hit a bump, it steers itself into another lane. I looked into a r&p for the stock steering, and found only bump steer issues. Example: Saab 78-90s tie rod ends are supposed to have the correct taper for the steering arms, and the rack is supposed to be the right width. There once was a company making a kit based on a center steer rack from cavaliers, but they couldn't get the bugs out and will not offer up details. Either go mustang II or let it be. Or hit a bump and crash into oncoming traffic. Whatever flips your trigger.
Let me help you out. http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=267899 http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=75313 http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=193742 http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=72871 http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=152076
Correct. If it doesn't perform well, you don't sell it to the public. Liability, and morals, matter to some business owners. Just because it fits, doesn't make it right.
my $.02 WOW Id say that rat fink guy knows from EXPERIENCE!! if you noticed he owns a 49 i dont know if i stressed that word enough so ill type it again EXPERIENCE!! ....If that dude can make that rack work but hes going to have to go through hell to do it , double his money and is going to endure several nights of trial and error...its retarded to even argue your point ....and secondly do you even own a 49-54 chev ... have you ever owned one or are you just thinking like a 60s muscle car guy ?? because thats what it sounds like take it from some one who owns a 51 msutang II is the way to go ...you sound alot like someone who watches monster garage and works at pep boys .
if you have a MII ifs I was not downing it I was just concerned and did not know alot about them. no problemo. many people feel as you do as far as the pinto/ mustang being ****py little cars so the suspension must be junk....heck so did I back before I started reading up on this stuff. I think everyone should get a FATMAN FABRICATIONS catalog. even if you are never going to install one. lots of good info in there on the whys and how and whats of MII suspenion. I believe that is where I got my info on installing racks in these cars as well, though it could have been a magazine article from who knows where.
Ok I did not start the thread to become a smash board for each other. I was trying to share something I found and I am going to try to work. I do appreciate the input from everyone. Guys I have thought about the bump steer issue. if it doesn't measure out then I will find one that does. I am going to be honest here I came to this board a few months ago because the people here seemed like they wanted to help each other and were cool. I have been to other boards not as a participant but looking for different ideas and tech stuff and the guys on there were really nasty to each other. I have to say this place is becoming like those other boards over the last month the fighting on these discussions has gotten to the point where I am not sure I want to be a part of this anymore. everyone here has made some valid points and maybe I did not explain as well as I should have in the original post by the measurements and it caused confusion. I appreciate the advice from the guys who have tried it or have been on a build when someone has tried it and the issues they faced are definately burned in as things to remember and try to do away with. If I find something that works the aftermaket guys will steal it anyway and you wont be able to get a powersteering rack for 125.00 bucks anymore they will be 1000 dollars and the guy with the 88 regal will be pissed.
I remember my parents having a Mustang II when I was a kid and remember the car being small not that it was ****py of course I also remember my dad fighting it one day because a tierod broke going down the road. but i figured with as heavy as the 53 is that it might put alot of stress on the IFS and rack but I have seen alot of guys doing it and have not heard of anything bad.
Well you be sure and let me know how that works. I already feel bad for anyone with a 88 Regal. Maybe you can put in the tilt steering and c***ette radio from the same donor?
okay one... the after market suspension setups that say mustang II are kind of deceiving the only thing they share from the original mustang II are the geometry and spindles, the tie rod breaking on the stang II back in the day will not matter as the rack and pinions that come with the aftermarket kits are from a mid 80s tbird, people here are trying to help you and help them selves by not letting you get out on the road and potentially hurt yourself or more importantly a car full of kids going to church, just because "yea it feels like it steers okay", or "yea it works **** it lets go" was good enough for you and your shadetree mechanic that had to get on here and take up for you. THE REASON AFTERMARKET STUFF WORKS IS YEARS OF R&D IN A SHOP SOMEWHERE, THEN MILES AND MILES OF ROAD TESTING ON CLOSED ROADS and to big rudy, noone cares what you have built or what you have read, if you were any kind of man your wouldnt get on here bickering about some **** that your computer on your alignment rack at pep boys told you because you helped(held a wrench) build a 49 ford or built(bolted on some stuff from fabtech) on some 4x4s doesnt mean your a master fabber and equipped to do a task such as this and throwing out facts like your ase certified... come on now, i know some doctors that have doctorates that shouldnt be practicing, all an ASE certification means is you p***ed some cl***es in a room somewhere. big deal, if it werent for the fact that you came on here bragging and *****ing like a 13 yr old then i would be like yeah go for it test it and let us know how it works. but you get no respect from me coming here with that at***ude toward 49ratfink or 53sled who obviously know what they are talking about.
awww.... Big Rudy's post is gone... and russnun doesn't want to listen. Don't sweat it. No one here knows what they're talking about anyway. NOT! Sheesh, people try and help and they are told that it's gonna be done anyway and that there will be "told you so's" Ch***is and suspension is nothing to play with without using proper geometry. It puts people lives in jeopardy. Though I believe in letting someone win a Darwin award I'm not a fan of them taking someone out with them. Do some research, find out why and how a proper R&P setup should be setup. Like was said if there was a miracle setup it'd be all over the place. Like was said one time, there are no free lunches...
Hey no one said I would not listen alot of it is how people come off here. I appreciate the help with this but the put downs are ridiculous and I have not once said that no one knows what thier talking about it is one thing to be helpful it is another to just get here and come off like your ransom olds himself. Look I come here for advice because I am mainly a fabricator and body guy not a suspension or ch***is guy. I thought I was doing right and the part may work and wanted to share it and I was discussing the MII with Rat fink and he gave me some good advice on the MII. because if you look in the whole post I had a said I did not have much knowledge on the MII so unless you have something to say to help dont bother with more bull ****.
I have had a MII on both my 53 chevy's for 10yrs plus and have never had a problem. I hope the conversion works for you but if not there are plenty of companies that can help you out with a MII.
Hey look the tie rod breaking was just a memory of the car i also remember it was red I was a little kid maybe about 7 or 8. I did not say I would not use it because of that. just a memory of my dad and the car. I also remember getting *** whooped on the side of the road because I kept messing with my brother in the car but that has nothing to do with it. just memories. Hey man I never said I was gonna slap it in just rip around the nieghborhood and yeh **** it it's good enough is not the way i do things. I did not know that the T-bird parts are what is used see I learned something new thank you. I am not downing the MII suspension I was just concerned because the car was small but I was discussing it with rat fink earlier and he gave me some good advice on a place for research. I really did not want this post to turn into a giant fight and argument I was hoping to do some good here.
Thanks I have not heard of anyone having problems with them I have heard of guys blowing out vega boxes but that is the worst of it not sure why but they blow out but if a t-bird rack is used with those that is a big heavy car so I can certainly see why no one would have problems. also the rat fink explained it earlier made really good sense on how the the weight would be more forward so less stress would be applied.
Like others before me have tried to say..you will be applauded if you find a 'new' setup that works and is that available but you will be lamented and mourned if you don't listen to those who know better
Older MII conversion on my 54 3100 (TRUCK) with V8 drives amazingly nice. Was converted in the 80s sometime then used as a daily by PO for many years. He also towed a small horse trailer with it fairly regularly. No power on the rack yet it's easy to steer around in the driveway with one hand when I've needed to move it without starting it. Parking is cake. Out on the road, well it's surprising to me how easy and well this old truck drives. Slow or not so slow. I have been driving it to work on some narrow local country roads that are pretty crowned and bumpy in spots and it just tracks great. I expect it'll be better once it has two working rear shocks and four new tires... After sitting for over 7 years, everything looks solid and seems to be in good shape after a little grease, some fresh brake lines and general cleaning. Just one POV. hdh
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