Trying to engineer cowl steering. Tire hits drag link on left turn. The only fix I can see is a steering arm about 10" long. Any other suggestions?
You must have the drag link hanging out a ways.....Using a Speedway steering arm and a Schroeder Sprint Car box, mine clears the tire by a few inches at full left. Try to post some pictures. Pat
I am still building it all but the drag link is only as far out as it has to be so it doesn't hit the cowl on a left turn. I looked at speedway's steering arms just to get an idea. Some just don't list the length and the ones that do aren't long enough. It looks like I need one around 9 inches long. My mock up tires and wheels are pretty close to what I will run, 14" ford ranger wheels with 195 70s. I would like to go with an inch narrower wheel and 185 75 tires eventually so that would make a little more room. Also my axle is an Econoline and the spindle bolt pattern is smaller than the more conventional Fords The steering arm is a curved affair coming up off the bottom of the spindle. Whatever I end up with will have to be fabbed up.
Me to. I used a Schroeder box with a 7 inch CC pitman and a Speedway spindle fork with 600/16 Excelsor radials and the tires missed the draglink about 3/4 of an inch
I moved my tie rod on my drag link to the inside of the pitman arm and cut a recess into the cowl. Made for even less foot room but it clears the tyre now Pete
Thanks for the tip striper. I just checked and flipping the tie rod to the inside would gain me quite a little. I could leave the grease fitting out and plug the hole, still have room to pull the plug and put in a zerk to grease it with the wheels turned hard right. That is a nice looking ride you have there.
Usually by the time the tire touches you are in the ditch! Sure at full lock it may touch but you never get to that point in real world driving conditions anyway. Some cars (like my T) touch the drag link and some even rub the bones depending on setup. If it bothers you, add a bigger steering stop.
That 9" +/- sounds about right. Plenty to see here to Get you started. http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=536915 Rolling bones took alot of inspiration from the Doane Spencer car. Search them also I'm sure there are a few thousand different ways to do cowl steering. But most folks say the DS roadster as a whole can't be improved upon. There's quite " the to do " made about the steering arm he fabricated. When I first started research I couldn't see the big deal, just a steering arm right?. Well it makes the drag link near parallel with the hairpins, to eliminate bump steer. Clears the tire in a left turn. There is a relationship between the length of steering arm & pitman arm that effects steering effort. The steering wheel diameter and internal ratio of the box related to the pitman arm also effect steering effort. The lenght of pitman arm decided the location of the box when the draglink was made parallel. The height of the steering arm plays into that also. Lots of engineering in that.
do your research,every car (set up is a little different) rolling bones is a good source for parts and questions. They are really nice guys, that are willing to help answer any questions u may have!!(do some research first ) !!! lots of luck to you!!!!
OK, I decided to plow ahead on it. With striper's advice to put the rear tierod end opposite I gained quite a bit. Here are before and after pictures of the modification to the steering arm, just tacked on. I ended up with a steering arm 7 5/8 center of kingpin to center of draglink hole. My pitman arm is almost 8" center to center but my chain drive reduces the steering by a ratio of 11:16. Three turns lock to lock. Both my trailing arm and drag link are nearly parallel with the ground. 1/10 bubble off at most. Before picture after picture Here is a fuzzy shot of the whole thing. You can see where I tried to run the pitman shaft out at first. The mess under the dash. The draglink does touch the tire on hard left but when I get to the final tire size I want I don't think it will.
Trent, it's more for parking and stuff. I realize going down the road I would never turn it that far but it is nice to have one that turns tight when you are backing around or doing a U turn. I had a T bucket that only turned about halfway in one direction and it was a real pain in the **** just to get it off the trailer and into the garage. Just the old dirt car racer coming out in me I guess,lol. The farther it steers, the harder you can drift it.
I know this is probably blasphemy but where the hell did Doane Spencer put his feet? Looks like that box is seriously cutting into footspace.
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