sperical rod end bearings as outer trackrod ends????

16th April 2011, 10:41

now i can post where i initially wanted this too go il try again...

im sure ive seen a few cars runnning spherical rod ends as outer track rod ends... but with them slung under the sterering arms? to reduce the angle on the arms and reducing bumpsteer and the likes, anyone shed any light?
im sure i didnt dream it up?
tommy

16th April 2011, 12:46

What would you like to know

16th April 2011, 12:54

was i dreaming? lol......

any piccies of your setup? and whats the thread in the rack arms? cant get to the car for a bit, to check...

16th April 2011, 23:01

i have gaz gold, and gaz mod the orginal sturts when fitting and can or do fit the tracking arm upside down, then u use the left side track road end onf the right and right on the left, then fit them upside down, helps stop bump steer,

hope thats what you was thinking?

17th April 2011, 21:52

I'll be doing this as soon as I finish Uni in a few weeks. Going to drill the original taper out and machine a new tapered plug, weld it in upside down (taper down) and use the OEM TRE's for now and see how it goes.

17th April 2011, 23:20

It shouldn't be too hard. If the threads on the OEM ends are a weird size, you can aways drill them out and tap or timesert them to the size of the chosen rosejoint.

18th April 2011, 11:52

treads are M14 x 1.25 RH on the strut end and M14 x 1.25 LH on the rack end

18th April 2011, 12:04

cheers lads! so actually as ive got a non pas rack i could keep the inners for a little vibration dampening and just do the outers then.......... thats it sorted then. drill the strut and knock up some inserts, job done.
thanks for the pm steff mate.......
tommy

18th April 2011, 20:11

bumpsteer is evil...

by altering the position of the outer rod end in relation to the arm on the strut (with spacers) you can dial out a fair bit of the effect..

you`ll need to remove your springs and then move the wheel up and down through its range of travel while checking how the wheel moves through its toe in/toe out and adjust accordingly...

19th April 2011, 10:02

seems like a ot of work for no advantage --just move the steering arms down the struts and use std track rod ends
never had a problem with bump steer doing it this way and spherical joints are always very short lifed things anyway --they will rattle very quickly +if used on the road then modifying the track rods with time serts etc makes it illegal anyway if the tester is being picky ,and you would need rubber boots onthe sphercial joints as well ,.
if lowering the arms down the struts is not enough then you are running too low and drive shaft angles will be wrong +sap alot of power

19th April 2011, 10:26

i wouldnt trust my welding and ability to ge the arms perfectly square on the struts, and making up a jig to do it for me is a pain.
the pas racks and non pas racks have the centre fixing in different places(heights) so the non pas rack the centre bushes are lower on the body, making even 50mm drop a stretch on the arms. now one of the few things i do remember from school is how angles change and the rate of steer changes more the lower you go. as im sure your aware. so to get the arms straight as possible means il have something in the region of 60mm up or down without any real effect on the tracking. so unless my car is in the air, (hopefully unlikely )there will be considerably less bump steer.
:-)

19th April 2011, 10:30

oh also ive got some dyno figures somewhere of transmission losses through varying ride heights, also with caster and camber adjustments.
although not from a french car, (classic mini) ill dig them out. some of them may surprise how miniscule the variations where.

19th April 2011, 11:06

if the grease can boil in the outer c/v joints ,then its not a small amount of power .
old mini always has straighter shaft angle than a saxo ,

19th April 2011, 17:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by axsaxoman

seems like a ot of work for no advantage --just move the steering arms down the struts and use std track rod ends

if theres no advantage then why do you move the arms down?? also if cutting the arms off, moving them down, aligning them perfectly to keep the ackerman correct and then rewelding them ISNT a lot of work compared to drilling and tapping either end of a piece of bar then i must be missing something.......

26th April 2011, 15:24

how low would you say is too low? i dropped the car onto its cut down stops and had a nose at the shafts, even at this ride height the n/s shaft has more rearward angle as the diff is further forward than the hub,than it does upward angle.
it doesnt obviously run that low, but wanted to asses the situation.

6th May 2011, 13:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by slammed106

if theres no advantage then why do you move the arms down?? also if cutting the arms off, moving them down, aligning them perfectly to keep the ackerman correct and then rewelding them ISNT a lot of work compared to drilling and tapping either end of a piece of bar then i must be missing something.......

theres no advantage in using rose joints over std TRE,just downsides they will wear quickly and rattle ,
moving the arms down the struts stops bump steer .