Technical Front Panhard Bar Design Questions

When doing a front panhard bar, can it have urethane bushings on both ends ?
The next question is should the panhard bar be level with the tie rod and axle ?
I do know that it should be anchored to the frame on the drivers side, I had thought that I could attach the other end to my passenger side wishbone.

 

Anyone ?

 

What is your steering setup?

 

So -Cal 4" dropped axle and split wishbones. Spring mounted 3" behind the axle from the sides of the bones.
Corvair reversed box for push pull side steer.

 

Blue--That should work fine. If you have the correct caster and alignment, though, a Panhard Rod isn`t strictly necessary. If you have the room (not much on a spring behind setup) go ahead and put it on....

 

I'm planning to install one attached to the inside of my split wishbone using Pete&Jakes hard urethane bushings. I've seen it done and when asked, the owner of a local deuce roadster said it works very well.

 

Bushings are fine. As close to level as you can practically get it, at loaded ride height.

The debate on direction might rage, but, since it is the front, and you don't have cross-steering, it won't matter.

And yes, if your front end is properly constructed, you don't need one.

 

Thanks guys. I think that I will have room and believe that my front end might work fine without one.
The key work there is might, so if I can I will install one just in case.

A steering dampener is something I can add afterwards if needed and I am aware that there is a lot of debate over the need for both panhard rods and or steering dampeners

 

A lot of people make the mistake of regarding a Panhard bar as a sort of supplementary axle-locating device on an early Ford front end. It isn't: it is actually a very effective axle-locating device on its own. Deciding whether or not to fit a Panhard bar determines how you would set up the front end otherwise. You're either designing a front end located by a Panhard bar or you're designing a front end located by something else.

You wouldn't use a Panhard bar and a Watts linkage on the same axle, because either they would describe the same rotational geometry at only one point in the axle's travel or they would not describe the same rotational geometry at all. Either way the axle can't move as it ought, and trying to will at best wear stuff out very quickly and at worst break things.

The stock set-up constrains the axle to rotate freely about an instant centre detemined by the spring shackles, and elastically about a point somewhere around the underside of the spring. It can get very complicated because the system was designed almost half a century before the suspension theory that describes it was developed. It works well enough within the conditions it was originally likely to encounter.

A Panhard bar constrains the axle to rotate about the intersection of the bar with a vertical plane along the centre of the car, and no other point. If the front end is otherwise set up to rotate about any other point there will be conflicting geometries, making the spring do something more than hold up the car. With a Panhard bar the shackles should be near vertical, so that the instant centre they describe is either extremely far above or below the road or undefined. The idea is to make the shackle instant centre irrelevant so that the Panhard bar can do that job.

 

I would like to hear comments on this application.

 

Mercedes-Benz used something similar to locate rear axles in the '30s. A pin on the DeDion axle engaged with a slot in the rearend housing:

I understand Maserati had something similar at the time.