Cowl steering boxes, options please.

My box came with a stock Schroeder arm. It was like 13 inches long! It just cut off some of it, radiused the end for looks, redrilled and tapered the hole and called it good. My arm is 5 or 6 inches long now.

 

I have an Econoline I was going to use but the power steering box in a Chevy Astro van caught my eye. It is a nice compact reversed box. I will post some pics when I get started fabbing it up.

 

I would like something that looked like this or something cast:

Did yours look like this:

If so, how did you hand the mill down the middle when you shortened and re-drilled? Or was it just flat?

 

Mine looked like the lower one, but was just flat. There is looks of meat on it if you wanted to do a little custom shaping. I also put a little bend in mine to clear the cowl.

 

Ahhh!

Here's a question for you cowl steering guys, since we're on the subject. How are you sealing the gear body or the shaft where it penatrates the cowl to keep moisture out? I was thinking a leather grease seal might be cool to get the job done.

 

It took a piece of vacuum line and slit it up the side, then put that around the hole in the body. Does that make sense? It works okay.

 

i just figger that in a roadster it won't matter much whether it's sealed or not.

now in a coupe like 3wlarry's car, though, it would prolly be good to seal it up, especially if you have heat &/or a/c. i bet if you look back through larry's build posts there might be a good solution.

 

How 'bout a grommet like for runing wiring through a firewall?

 

That would work as long as it's the gear housing you're sealing. If it's the shaft it'self that just sticks through, that's another story. Would need a dynamic face seal or something.

Anyone have any better pictures of how they mounted they're Schroeder? Does the housing and shaft stick through the body or just the shaft?

 

I've seen some that instead of a hole in the middle, have a thin flexible membrane type thang goin' on, trim to fit.

 

Simple square split-clamp blocks that bolt to flat bars and pinch the side tubes simultaneously. It ain't a Schroeder but works exactly the same.

The housing goes through the body.

I can't understand why you guys don't use the vintage sprint car cast iron boxes....they're much slower than the Schroeder units (usually 14 : 1) so they're much more streetable. You can use a longer pitman arm.

 

I got mine from BenD and i don't know where the Raven got his but they are identical.

I can't even post you a pic of the box (no batteries for the camera), but I think there are some pics on here in Raven61 old build posts search over the last year and look for something on '27 roadster or the like.

The manufacture tag on the box gives a build date of 3/71. The part number is 678321 if that helps at all.

I guess that makes it not traditional at all but it will give me something to hang onto and doesn't weigh much.

 

Excellent info and great picture! Where do you even get one of those JF?? I personally would consider it. If I bought a Schroeder I would get the 10:1, but yours might be a good option too. A 12:1 with a 7 or 8 inch pittman arm seems like it would be just perfect.

 

The one in that photo I built from a Ross/Crosley gear.....too puny for a street rod. I have a sprint gear for sale in the HAMB "Wanted" cl***ifieds. Here's a link : http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=132026

 

Theres got to be more options. I'm thinking about making my own box, just from parts, from the "Grainger" catalog. What do you think???

 

Not worth reinventing the wheel. You're better off at least starting with a junk box and rebuilding it. You would need a very good quality worm and mating gear as well as a way to hold lube and everything else. You're going to spend more money trying to do CORRECT than just using pre-existing parts. That's my $.02, FWIW. Steering is nothing to mess around with.

 

Just picked up this old sprint car (midget maybe?) frame to use the steering gear out of. It's a Ross unit and appears to be in good working order. Not sure what year or what this gear originally came from but I'm going to try to use it in my car for cowl steering.