Chevelle Rack & Pinion offered

[va72mlibu]

I saw a blurb on the SEMA site about Flaming River winning a New Product award for a Rack and Pinion steering set-up for A-Bodies. I emailed them for more info and got this reply:

Our new power rack&pinion kit for the 'A" bodys' is a bolt in kit,that includes the power rack,cradle,paintable tilt steering column,pump,remote resevoir,u-joints,shafting, and all of the needed hardware to install the kit with.
The kit does not include the pump bracket,or hoses,but are available.
The kit has a part number of FR313KT,for a price of $2,750.00.
The kits will be available for shipping at the end of this month.



Thoughts?

[derekf]

Only thought that comes to mind is that I obviously am in the wrong hobby -- 2750 seems insanely expensive and I don't see any real gain.

(not that the email specified) Does it really gain anything over a well-set-up steering box? Tie-rod locations moved at all?

[va72mlibu]

"conventional wisdom" says that rack & pinion is better, but I don't know why. I was hoping someone could explain the benefits of this as well.

[4MuscleMachines]

I have tried two RP's from Flaming River on early Mustangs and the only issue I had was they would have some side to side movement due to their brackets flexing laterally. I haven't seen the pics for the A-body application, but if you look at Mustang application pics, you will understand why.

Otherwise, they fit well and performed decently. Being I have a 70 Chevelle, I would be interested in finding out more info as well.

[6'9"Witha69]

Having driven cars with Lee engineering or similar built factory boxes (ie DSE) there is no benefit in the R&P kit over a good box unless, as steted above by derekf, the tie rods have been moved to correct bumpsteer etc. I do not think flaming river REALLY takes this into account when designing their kits. It appears more of a hot rod part like bolt in 4 links. I say quality built factory box and something like the Baer Tracker outer rods.

[astroracer]

With all things being equal the only "gain" you will see is a little "loss" of weight. A rack is a few pounds lighter then a box. Is a few pounds less weight worth 2800 bucks on a street car? Not in my book... Moving the battery to the back would accomplish about the same thing.
The big problem here is that "most" things wont be equal when it comes to retro-fitting a rack to a box equipped car. It is damn near impossible to get the rack inner pivots where they need to be to keep bumpsteer at bay.
I was checking out their site yesterday and read their write-up. I liked the statement they made about their kit;
"The system locates the tie rods closer to the original operating plane."
Closer then what? The original System? That makes me worry about bumpsteer and what all else is going to go to hell for my 2800 dollars. It would be nice if they would make some statements as to what this system actually improves other then keeping the full turning radius.
Sorry about the mini-rant guys. I see this stuff all day long. Playing on the "mystique" and taking the "unknowledgable" for a ride...
Mark

[TUBED]

Check TRZ Motorsports ie... www.trzmotorsports.com, I know they mainly build drag car parts but their setup with a manual Flaming River rack is cheaper compared to the $2,750.00 for $850.00.
Read their site carefully, the parts for this setup can be bought seperately, so if you don't need something it might be cheaper than $850.00. It comes with billet steering arms and bump steer kit w/spherical ends.
Also keep in mind they make R/P setups for 1st & 2nd Gen. Camaros, 3rd & 4th Gen. Novas, and G-body's.
I hope this helps. Gerald

[astroracer]

Check TRZ Motorsports ie... www.trzmotorsports.com, I know they mainly build drag car parts but their setup with a manual Flaming River rack is cheaper compared to the $2,750.00 for $850.00.
Read their site carefully, the parts for this setup can be bought seperately, so if you don't need something it might be cheaper than $850.00. It comes with billet steering arms and bump steer kit w/spherical ends.
Also keep in mind they make R/P setups for 1st & 2nd Gen. Camaros, 3rd & 4th Gen. Novas, and G-body's.
I hope this helps. Gerald

At least these guys are telling you the racks don't work properly. For drag racing the bumpsteer kits will probably work okay. Skinny front tires and no real input from cornering forces won't stress the joint as much as the big fat tires and high cornering forces realized by a road racing/protouring style car. "Bump Steer" kits lengthen the outer tie rod joint to a point where bending is a real issue with the bolts that hold them together. This not only reduces steer input and feel it is dangerous as the bolt reaches the breaking point through work hardening.
This just boils down to the point that, to work correctly, to work "as designed", the suspension needs to be designed around the steering rack. This is the only way to be sure the rack will work properly. Not vice-versa... Simply bolting on a rack, for whatever reason, be it the "cool", "wow", "look what I did", "this is what the racer dudes do", kind of reason, does NOT guarantee it is going to work better then the box. In 99% of most cases it will NOT. I will gladly play the devils advocate here when I tell you guys this. As someone said early "conventional wisdom" says a rack is better. I will tell you "conventional KNOWLEDGE" says it isn't...
Mark

[Marcus SC&C]

I checked this R&P out at SEMA. I have to say I was pretty impressed with their elegant solution to the rack width issue (all common racks are about 8" too wide for an A body and will cause epic bumpsteer). They basically made a center link with the end bent 90* and bolted it to the ends of the rack! Duh...why didn`t anyone else think of that (like ME!). I was told that the inner pickups (heims,not my favorite for this application) are at EXACTLY the stock locations when installed. That`s good and bad,good that the bumpsteer correction built into our packages should work just as well with the FR R&P. Bad,because they could have made it much better in the first place. I wasn`t able to verify the measurments because they were watching me like a hawk. ;) I`m curious how it`ll look/work installed because looking at out test chassis it seems like it would be farther forward and mess up the ackerman,yet they say the ackerman remains unchanged. I have to reason to doubt them but I`d liek to play with one and verify things for myself (which I may just do when they become available). The only downside I see to it is that the input shaft it pointing almost straight up so a pair of double U joints and 2 support bearings will probably be required to hook it to the steerign column (uses stock column BTW). Interesting but the jury is still out. Mark SC&C

[Pro-Tour Heavy Chevy]

It looks rather flimsy to me. The center link looks like it could have all kinds of deflection issues, they also use the same set up on there 55-57 t-birds. More engineering is required here. Unisteer is suppose to be working on one as well, so lets see what they come up with.

[krisk]

http://www.unisteer.com/mm5/merchant...CHEVROLET+CHVL

here is one by unisteer for about $1500

[John McIntire]

why do people switch over to Rack and Pinion? What are the benefits?

[6'9"Witha69]

Weight and feel. Newer boxes are lighter and have the same valving and feel. It is a lot of wow factor anymore.

[matthimself456]

If you want great steering send me your $2800. I will get you set up and use the $2200 left over to start a new project.

[LowBuckX]

I so wish I could comment on this And Flamers river.
BUt I can say one thing contrary to what Astroracer said. Racks can be shorted and widened a large amount to fit any ball center that you can think of to fit our cars.. I do it every day. I think 16 inches (rod end to rod end not ball center) is the narrowest Ive built so far. But this takes a shop that knows the inner workings and limitations of a rack and the know how and right people and eqiupment to do the job.
None of the off the shelf (OEM) racks could meet the needs of classic cars. And some times you have to look at European offerings to find the right angles steer location the modify from there.

[Taylor1969]

$2800

[pav8427]

Hey Lowbuck, Got any tips or tricks for us Backyard Engineers on how to shorten a C4 rack? I'm looking at a ball to ball of 21.75.
Is that possible with this rack? I pretty much have it figured out how I am going to do it, yet are there any tricky parts?
Can I get there with just cutting the rack down or will I have to shorten the housing also?

Thanks, Doug

[Marcus SC&C]

I just got off the phone with Steve and Benny at Unisteer,talking with them about their A body R&P. As soon as I saw a pic of their system I knew that they knew what the issues were and how to correct them. It remains to be seen how well is`s been executed but I was very encouraged by talking to them. Short,rigid mounting brackets,proper inner tie rod spacing,stock ackerman and an input shaft that`s not vertical (although it`s still got pretty much of an angle to it). From what they`ve told me they optimized the length of the tie rod ends (better than stock) but left the vertical pretty much alone so our suspension packages,ATS tall spindles etc. "should" work well with them. Again that remains to be seen but I`m guardedly optimistic. I made arrangements to get a pre production Unisteer R&P to try on our `70 Chevelle test chassis. I told them I`d be putting a bump steer gauge on it and they didn`t even flinch. That actually suprised the hell out of me,normally mentioning a bumpsteer gauge to aftermarket R&P guys is like showing a vampire a crucifix. It may be a few weeks before we get it and get a chance to test it out but I`ll post the results here when the results are in. Mark SC&C

[LowBuckX]

Hey Lowbuck, Got any tips or tricks for us Backyard Engineers on how to shorten a C4 rack? I'm looking at a ball to ball of 21.75.
Is that possible with this rack? I pretty much have it figured out how I am going to do it, yet are there any tricky parts?
Can I get there with just cutting the rack down or will I have to shorten the housing also?

Thanks, Doug

Honestly No wouldnt know where to begin. Ive never had one open. Most Gm steering gears are overly complicated.
If your hell bent on using the C4 rack make sure you study it well before cutting into it. Port inlets may need to be moved. The actual rack will need to be shortened to your specs. The housing would need to be shorted as well. Then you have to find rod ends that work make sure its mounted taking into acount for all the geometry.