Bolt on Manual Steering Rack

SCrazy

SCCoA Member
Well almost.....

After alot of research and help from a bunch of people on this site I've found a bolt on manual steering rack option for our cars that uses the stock outer tie rod ends and ball joints.

It starts with a Flaming River manual rack for a 1994-2004 Mustang. You then must replace the inner tie rods that come with the Flaming River rack with Mood EV405 inner tie rod ends. These are from early 90s Dodge Caravans.

The stock outer ends then attach directly.

The rack and inner tie rod assembly winds up about 1.5" shorter than the stock assembly but there was plenty of extra length where the inner and outer ties rods mate to allow the threads to be fully engaged and provide whatever slight adjustment was needed.
 
Figured I would give this a little update so it was more complete:

Once I removed the power steering pump I found the accessory belt was in conflict with the lower radiator hose. As suggested by someone else I swapped my water pump for a pump from a '89 3.8 na. The connection for the lower radiator hose on the original pump comes off angled toward the radiator while on the new pump it is basically parallel to the front of the block which allowed the lower hose to clear the new belt routing. I was able to reuse the stock lower hose. One nice side benefit is the lower hose no longer runs through the belt but rather around it.

This pump might not work as well for someone with all their heating accessories (heater core, oil cooler, etc) in place, I have none of these. The connection for the accessory loop in is a different location and would require a fair amount of rework.

I have also previously deleted my A/C so I wound up with a 47.75" belt.
 
Thanks for this write up, Brian. It really saves me a lot of research, haha. I'm going to do this while I have the motor out.

I ran into the belt problem whenever I removed the power steering pump, too. I cut the lower radiator hose short, rotated the hose so it points away from the radiator, and then easily fabricated a water tube. I also bought a six rib belt and put them on the first six ribs of the pulley, to give extra clearance.

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You can see the part number for the belt I used, too.
 
Ah yes....that's the post that got me going in the right direction. I found the belt you used to be way to long...do you have underdrive pulleys?

Hmmm, I used stock diameter pulleys, I did an A/C delete and the Alternator remained in the stock location for that setup. My current setup is far more radical.
 
I had the underdrives...hard to believe that is worth 3" of belt length but I guess that must be the difference.
 
With the Flaming River manual rack how is steering feel both not moving and moving? I wonder if there is a quick ratio rack option for us people not drag racing.

Shane
 
I really haven't cornered hard with the car and the manual rack so I really can't comment on steering feel. There is definately some effort required to turn the car when moving slowly (two hands) but it's not terrible. I'm certain my wife would not want anything to do with it though.

A quicker ratio rack would be much harder to turn....I'd want to feel that in another car before I installed it.
 
One other thing I've forgotten to mention that I just remembered while helping Smitty get ready to do this. The shaft on the new rack for the steering input is smaller diameter than the stock input shaft. I needed to order a different flaming river steering joint to make it work.

This is a link to the joint I used: http://www.jegs.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/KeywordSearchCmd?storeId=10001&catalogId=10002&langId=-1&Ntk=all&Jnar=0&Ne=1%2B2%2B3%2B13%2B1147708&searchTerm=898-FR1709DD you will also need a piece of the DD shaft if you are adapting from the stock joint to this one.
 
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I believe the stock rack uses a 3/4"-36 spline connection. I am not sure what the next size down is.
 
That would be nice

I believe the stock rack uses a 3/4"-36 spline connection. I am not sure what the next size down is.

I sure hope that is the case, cause they have a direct fit U-Joint with out having to adapt anything else, but will see when I get home this evening.

It is the FR2508.

Smitty
 
The DD end of the ujoint is on the steering column side and the 9/16-26 end is on the steering rack side so you need a joint that is DD to 9/16-26
 
Yepper

The DD end of the ujoint is on the steering column side and the 9/16-26 end is on the steering rack side so you need a joint that is DD to 9/16-26

Yeah Brian I ordered it last night with the DD on one side and the 9/16 26 spline on the other. I have a good friend, well you remember Jeff, when your Axle broke in OK, him. He has lots of extra parts cars where he works, so he is looking for a longer DD Shaft to fix to the original steering shaft.

I just hope it doesn't take to long to get here! Engine compartment looks so nice, all empty and almost clean.

Removed old steering rack last night, and noticed outer tie rod end are useless, and rusted, so time for my warranty to kick in and get some new ones.

hey did you get a full alignment done afterwards or just get the toe in set?

Thanks for the help on this project. I have several other fun things I am working on as well, but will show those at the shootout!

See Ya!
 
If you need to buy a length of the DD stuff let me know I think I have a bunch left from when I did mine and I could give you what you need (I'd just have to find it??)

I had a full alignment done....no problems.
 
U-Joint

Holy Crap, I couldn't believe how expensive those U-Joints are. I found one for $75, but man talk about sticker shock! I wasn't ready for that, you could have warned me! LOL :D

Anyway, will talk closer to shootout time and see what we can do to help with the Pig Roast. Thanks for all the help on this project!

See Ya!

Smitty
 
They have gold plated roller bearings I think.

Doing a pig roast this weekend for the Little League........about the same size as the shootout. Should be a good practice round.....
 
Notes on install!

If you need to buy a length of the DD stuff let me know I think I have a bunch left from when I did mine and I could give you what you need (I'd just have to find it??)

I had a full alignment done....no problems.

OK I have the new steering rack in and all works great.................but!

When installing motor and installing Long Tube headers the steering joint where the original DD rod went through to the steering column it hit hard on the headers and I couldn't steer it.

If anyone else is going to do this please note you have to move the steering knuckle and original pinch bolt as close to the steering gear box as you can to clear the headers.

After much pain and itchy suffering, (header wrap on headers was flaking badly) and remove the steering shaft complete from the vehicle I was able to pull enough out of the steering column to clear the headers and I can now steer again! Only took 3 hours to figure this out and get it to work.

In the air it feels very smooth and easy to turn, will see when it has full wieght on the wheels again.

Smitty
 
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