1968 Valiant SB 9.844 @ 134.04 - Now retired

Jon Connolly · Post by **Jon Connolly** » Thu Jul 22, 10 11:22 am

help for heroes is this weekend cav ... so i told them no

pete ... might be more hassle than it`s worth ???

Anonymous · Post by **Anonymous** » Thu Jul 22, 10 8:46 pm

Jon Connolly wrote:
Wash + polish

Then ready for pairing up with some of them B/B boys

Good luck Jon , will make sure i'm two cars back on fire up lane.

Jon Connolly · Post by **Jon Connolly** » Thu Jul 22, 10 9:57 pm

Adam

I`ll be a couple of rows back from you ... watch you run your 9.8 then pedal this hard for a 11.7 ish

Jon Connolly · Post by **Jon Connolly** » Fri Aug 06, 10 5:29 pm

Lightweight alluminium Mustang 2 rack and pinion steering going on now with fabricated 9/16 rod ends and new handed rose joint sections each side.

This will mount via 2 welded outriggers from the existing frame rails and be installed with nylon bushes. Steering colomn will have a uj so rack can be installed in the correct plane.

Am reusing the existing Mopar lca and uca and limiting the extent of front shock travel to keep the steering geometry in the right place ( the front should then lift and keep the wheels in the correct position rather than using up all suspension travel before lifting)

Also swapping out cast brake master cylinder for Wilwood alluminium / plastic cylinder.

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Fri Aug 06, 10 6:19 pm

Interesting, Jon.
How do you propose to get the akkerman (sP??) angles correct with this set up?

We will follow suit is if works OK

Blue · Post by **Blue** » Fri Aug 06, 10 6:37 pm

I'm not so sure limiting the front suspension travel is a good idea Jon. You normally do that when you are already lifting the wheels a good amount. Calvert recommend a minimum of 5" front suspension travel with Caltracs, you might find that limiting travel will just keep the wheels planted on the deck, cocking up your weight transfer. By all means try it, but I would avoid designing the system so it has to work that way.

Jon Connolly · Post by **Jon Connolly** » Fri Aug 06, 10 9:39 pm

Blue ... you`re right, that part of my set up works well, I like the Caltrac system and there isn`t any point changing it

Pete ... I`ll post pics as I go, it`s in my head at the moment. I think the key to it is getting the rack in exactly the right place ( i.e. height from ffl )

andyrob · Post by **andyrob** » Fri Aug 06, 10 10:02 pm

jon get some good advise before you fit the rack, or you'll end up with 'bump steer' which is sicence inself, which i dont understand, moving a rack up of down an inch can cause this making the car undrivable,so change to rack & pinion is a hugh differnce do some

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Fri Aug 06, 10 10:07 pm

I do know that swapping spindles/bottom ball joints from one side to the other (whilst looking like a quick and cheap fix) totally cocks up the steering geometry.

Dave999 · Post by **Dave999** » Mon Aug 09, 10 9:00 am

if you still have a K frame

all the hard work has been taken out

if you don't then i guess you could nick some of their ideas

http://www.elkoperformance.com.au/store ... oduct=1160

yes they do em for LHD

Dave

AllKiller · Post by **AllKiller** » Mon Aug 09, 10 9:26 am

Dont Unisteer make these too...but only in power

for Mopars.

http://www.unisteer.com/seach_by_vehicl ... body_.html

http://www.unisteer.com/custom_built_rack_pinions.html

Jon Connolly · Post by **Jon Connolly** » Mon Aug 09, 10 11:52 am

Had another good look at this this morning

Am confident .. will post up photos as I go

Anonymous · Post by **Anonymous** » Tue Aug 10, 10 10:25 am

Hi Jon,

Good times there fella, why's your MPH that low???

Bacca ever so slightly jealous, now lagging behind at 10.66@131

(New plan needed for an 8.99, get a Nova like Craig, with a Shafiroff 572 and give Mr.Hauser loads of money to sort it???)

Bad plan as I don't like Chevvies and I aint got no money, so its back to the drawing board methinks???

Jon Connolly · Post by **Jon Connolly** » Mon Aug 16, 10 3:39 pm

Mustang 2 rack and pinion wouldn`t fit due to being a " pusher " v`s a " puller ". Could have fitted it way out front and turned the bottom ball joints around so they faced forward and picked up on those, but would have been a P.I.T.A.

Have now got a Lotus rack and pinion narrowed which sits on an oval section steel tube dropped frame welded onto each chassis rail. Final connection will be via rose joints and have the option of top or bottom mounting on the existing ball joint aperture to get that final 1/2" of up / down adjustment.

Have made an adjustable suspension travel limiter also ( not in photos ) to allow the suspension to travel anywhere from 2.5" to it`s maximum of 4.5" to try to limit the overall arc of bottom ball joint travel. This can be completely bypassed if it hinders the launch.

Plenty of weight has come off and everything is in the right plane at all stages of front suspension travel.

Will try it out at HRD`s

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Mon Aug 16, 10 3:43 pm

Jon Connolly wrote:Mustang 2 rack and pinion wouldn`t fit due to being a " pusher " v`s a " puller ". Could have fitted it way out front and turned the bottom ball joints around so they faced forward and picked up on those, but would have been a P.I.T.A.

That's when the Ackerman angles go out of the window.

Good solution, do you think there would be enough sump clearance for a BB installation?

Keep at it!!

Pete