Well it seems my project has turned out better, for sure,....the Ford Taurus rack is out, and the Grand Am rack....substantially the same as Idar's Saab 900 rack is in....so I measured and checked a whole lot, and found that flipping the rack about 45 degrees on it's axis, top forward from Ida'r.s position, may just give me the right enough angle on the steering to allow the use of just two universal joints, instead of 3....
the thing is, I had to take a hole saw to the rear side of the driver's engine frame mount, and make room for the lower universal...lessening the angle to the drive shaft....used the same setup as for the Ford rack, but modified once again of course...
the output shafts to the tie rods had to be modified of course....angle fitting clearance of rear of lower controll arms and rack was critical....and so they were bent the opposite of a Grand Am Pontiac, and then the pass side one needed lengthening about 2 inches worth....once again my welder friend came in handy...

I"m not totally happy with the solutions so far, BUT progress is being made...

IF this ever works out, I will give total complete drawings and specs on parts, with pix.....no sense in anyone repeating MY mistakes....

GENE :flag :cool:

 

wow, I would REALLY appreciate the write-up on this when your done.
Unfortunately I would have no idea what to do, so i'm going to have to pay someone to do this... and I don't want them messing things up (because they have probably never done this before... and its not their car, so they'll probably not care so much about detail and perfection).

The Grand Am rack is a 2 turn, from lock to lock, right?

It just occured to me the other day why my eagle talon is such a breeze to manuever... in 1 palm of the wheel (from center), the wheels are completely turned. (ie. 2 turns lock to lock).

 

the rack I am working with is from an '89 ish Grand Am...junkyard...ie...simple to pull because the engine was out....and it's 2.8-9 something lock to lock...
turns the wheels further than need be actually, rubs the inner of the driver's tire but then again I have 255/50/17 tires on '92 vette rims in front...so they do drag the sway bars/frame anyway...no loss.......need extend the wheel knuckle rubbing block on the lower controll arm a bit more...my car HAD still a tighter radius then my '87 C4....but with the NEW limitations..from the rack...I will have to see....

any rate, the list of AMERICAN available parts with standard GM/industry part numbers from all the poopie needed will be available...

GENE

 

Well, I finally have it in and mounted what looks correctly, and all linkages in place, engine out, so I have to somehow put some weight in the car to flex the springs, and check out the steering, what a mess this was....larger mechanical prototypes can be a bitch sometimes....especially without a lift, and I"m certainly no teenager either, so it takes forever for me to climb in and out of that engine compartment, .....but today sometime I plan on putting wheels back on and doing some testing in the garage...maybe I will get two spring compressors to relax the suspension with...gotta check that tie rod end on the drivers' side....

GENE

 

I can't recall off hand. Is that Grand Am rack a center-take-off rack? (i.e. where do the tie rods attach? The center of the rack or at the ends?)

 

It's a center Take Off rack, so the tie rods are about 21" c-c....I needed to weld in 2" of length on the pass side, and need an inch on the drivers' side...as well as flip the end 90* so it doesn't hit the control arm...
this is all turning into a pain....I loaded the front end today, and turned it with no power steering,....the universal linkage was no problem..., troubles are the mounting arms I have here are flexing about 1/2 inch side to side...and they are all 1" steel L channel....boxed on the driver's side...still needs more...
going to try triangulating it, or fully boxing it....don't know which yet....
needs do something though....other than the tie rod ends and stiffening the lateral 'drift' to the rack itself ( mounting brackets) there seems to be no problem....turns my wide tires just fine...

GENE

 

Do you have any photos of your progress so far? I'd be interested in seeing what the setup looks like.

 

No pix yet, it looks a lot like idar's setup though, of course, just a slight position differance....I"m having troubles with the tie rods though...GM used some kind of cast steel porous material, and when welding it, it seems to not be so cool....I suspect another trip to the junkyard to find something made differantly, from another type car....I hate to have to get into welding and fabrication...on tie rods....but might have to....

GENE

 

That might actually be your best bet. Some rod of the proper length with some rod ends. Should be a pretty simple and easy setup. You can probably find a place online to make some up for you if you tell them the length and stuff.

Dave

 

Oh NOT so easy, I don't think right this second anyway....seems that CTO rack needs an offset to the tie rod ends at the rack...it's just a rubber pivot at that point...not really meant for any twisting other than around the axis of the bolt...I may have to fab a steel block to attach other pivots to....allowing more freedom of movement...I still have not done anything about that lateral movement in the rack, i moves the mounting laterally about 1/2 inch, without engine in it....but about 200 lbs of weight on frame, inaddition to car...
so it's about 400 lbs light, minimum....the grand am tie rods will NOT work...
just plain too many modifiactions to them....that cast iron/steel is too pourous to weld reliably...my friend, an expert welder is not happy....and he's picky....good thing, it IS the freaking STEERING for christsakes....

GENE