Power Steering anyone?

[kdavies3]

Hi gang,

Has anyone ever built a Dax or converted one to power steering? I guess if anyone has Dave has?
If so what rack was used?

I don't desperately need it but I think it would be a nicer car to drive especially when manouvering.

I;ve spoken to folks who've driven AK's demo car and they all reckon it's great with the PAS.

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Kev Davies
Dax, 383ci Chevy Stroker, Tremec TKO
South Wales

:tu

[TINKA]

Hi Kev, how are those muscles coming on in your left leg ? Have you tried giving AK a ring to see if it is possible to fit there system to a Dax ?x( x( x( x( I am quite sure that he has fitted it to other makes in the past.:tu :tu :tu :tu

Martin {-} {-} {-} {-}

[STEVE G]

I took my car up to Ken this week and after measuring things up it seems a non starter with their rack.AK mount the rack at the front, as does mine,but yours is at the rear so I,m not sure if it will fit.Ring Ken I'm sure hed be happy to look at it.
PS anyone know of a rack similar to a MK2 Escort that is Power????
Steve G {-}
GE427-Rover 281ci.(300+BHP)

[ian]

Guys, take a look at the 'I broke my Cobra' post dated July 3, 2003, in this section of the forum ie Dax technical questions. Peugeot 306 P.S. rack has been used before.

Ian

[dave]

The Peugeot rack is not suitable(Too long), it screws up the suspension geometry and you will then get bump steer.
There is no rack currently available on the market to suit the Dax.

It is critical that the length of the rack and the length of the steering tie rods match the way the suspension works on a car otherwise....................Bump steer!

[Steve]

The peugeot rack can be adapted fairly easily to exactly match the geometry of the dax manual rack. It needs machining of the case and rack, but its relatively straightforward.

I fitted one to my dax and it worked out fine, and using an electric pump would work with any engine combination.

[dave]

>The peugeot rack can be adapted fairly easily to exactly
>match the geometry of the dax manual rack. It needs machining
>of the case and rack, but its relatively straightforward.
>
>I fitted one to my dax and it worked out fine, and using an
>electric pump would work with any engine combination.
>
>



Hi Steve.
Could you let me know what mods are done or where to get them done, i would be very interested in being able to offer this as an option on my builds.

[Steve]

Dave
Sent you PM

[kdavies3]

Hi Steve, I would very much like to see the info too.
Please Please Please.

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Kev Davies
Dax, 383ci Chevy Stroker, Tremec TKO
South Wales

[Steve]

First off the peugeot power rack is like a manual rack, with an external ram bolted on, so it can be modified without effecting the internal fluid pathways found on most racks, and the lock to lock is quite low, so suits our application well.

I'll run through the steps

dissasemble rack (£30 from scrappie). The rack is from a 305/205 I believe, I have a picture somewhere I can post later, but its at home

After cleaning, machine 55 mm from centre of aluminium rack case & reweld, using clamps & spacers to hold it all in alignment along its length. you need to ensure the case remains aligned, and use a good welder for the aluminium. The type of aluminium in the case is readily weldable. Cleaning this properly is important, at gunge will screw up the weld. You need to degrease & pressure/steam clean thoroughly. I had two of these done

Machine out the end of the rack (the end where the piston actuator arm is attached, so that the actuator arm becomes detached.(falls off) take care not to enlarge this arm, its a press fit.(you can press this off, but I didn't have the correct press)
Finish machining the rack to reduce length by 55mm. Once this is done, and the ball joints are taken into consideration, the length, and therefore potential geometry, will be exactly the same as the dax rack


Re-Tap end of machined rack to accept track control arm.


Use the peugeot TC arms, These are hollow, and have a 14mm (I think) thread at the end to accept the peugeot TC balljoint. In the middle of the TCA there is a flat for tracking adjustment, you need to cut the TCA the rack side of this or you won't be able to cut a thread into the tube. Cut & machine finish . Re-Tap to accept peugeot rack joint. Use high grade 14mm thread bar to lengthen back to acceptable length about (6.5 ins thread bar from memory) then attach Jag metric track control arms . ensure thread bar is deep in both TCA, and TCjoints. You are essentially converting the hollow peugeot TC arms, to ones with a external thread to take the jag joints, the peugeot ones are easily long enough. You want to end up with both the TC arm, and ball joint almost fully threaded, and use loctite to fix the thread into the TCA. Use nuts to lock off the thread into both the TCA and ball joint. When finished you want as little thread showing as possible

You now have to mount the ram piston such that it will work, and be centralised about its operating range. I did this by assembling the rack, and mounting the piston almost under the rack body, making a bracket to hold both the rack and the piston. the piston mount has to be moved from its original location 'cos you've shortened the rack, and the best place was below the rack, tucked right up against the mounting flanges for the rack. As the rack is 55 mm short, you need to move the ram mount 55 mm, but check for its centralised movement before drilling. Once the location of this is set you can press the piston mouut back onto the rack, ensuring its orientation is correct for the new mount. Most of the effort in steering comes from the ram, and mounting this firmly is essential, (ie solid mount brackets), and because of this most of the strain is taken by the ram, not the rack body


Then it was a case of making sure I knew the centre of the racks lock to lock, and mounting the whole assembly on the chassis, using the original chassis mounting holes, to mark up the mount plate I made. I did angle the mount bracket to ensure a more direct run for the pinion drive, but I'm not sure thats essential. Dax informed me that the horizontal position of the mount was critical, but the rack could move fore or aft perhaps 10 or 15 mm with no effect. Note that you are looking for the centre of the rack, not the rack body position.

I made slots in the mounts so I could adjust horizontal & vertical position to adjust out bump steer, but when I put it all together with my "best Guess" positions, I could not see any difference between my measurements and the ones taken with the dax rack

The Dax steering shaft will slip right inside the peugeot one with a tight fit, and could be pinned, or welded, just as dax do when extending the column, or a splined shaft could be sourced to fit the peugeot. I changed the lower part of the lower UJ couplings to get the upper half to fit the dax, and lower half to fit the peugeot. That was the easiest as I did not have a welder to hand

The late citroen (saxo?)electric pump was used cos It was the same pressure as the one peugeot used, and I wanted to ensure I didn't have an issue with different pressures & flows from different manufacturers bits & pieces, (&cos I found a pump for £40, and wiring was easier than fiddling with mounting brackets for a pump, and if I didn't like it I could just whip it all out easily, & cos I didn't want drain on engine. There is one with an integral reservoir that with its mount bracket, fitted really well on the chassis, with holes easily drillable with body & engine is situ. For my trial I tie wrapped this firmly in place until I was sure the whole power rack thing was OK

Wiring is easy if you get the wiring loom & relay with the pump, the large wire goes through a 40a fuse from wherever you need . the small wire via a 1 amp fuse from the ignition. I also had a switch in line so I could turn the pump off if I needed to, (battery drain on start perhaps)

Other bits needed are replacement fluid hoses from pump to pinion, and thats about it

The tyres never touched arches, I had 17/235 toyos, on full lock the rims would kiss the anti roll bar, but only if held on full lock, I placed a plastic sleeve on the roll bar, (if you were fussed)


The rack was quicker in terms of turning circle, & lock to lock, but because it was so much easier, you could just turn lock to lock on the spot,therefore manouvering was like driving a normal production car - very easy. I could also opt for a smaller steering wheel It was not too light at speed though, there is enough assist but not too much


the real gain was ease of driving at speed, it was far quicker to hustle through bends after I made the rack up, and didn't seem so hard to drive at speed either, you still felt all the bumps etc, but you didn't feel the need to hold on with both hands, simply to blast around the lanes, it was all a bit more relaxed

This sounds much more complex than it was to do, and I costed it including the machining at less than £300

There is a chap who busted a dax rack, that is fitting the peugeot rack, he will be finished this week. He has opted to fit the pug rack as is to get his car back on the road fast, with a view to modifying later if the bump steer issue arises. He foung the peugeot rack I sent him bolted straight into the dax mounts with no mods to rack or chassis, but obviously he doesn't have an idea on how this will feel yet.

Interestingly on a side note, whle I was discussing all this with dax, they told me that there are some cars where the TCA go from the centre of the car and are perhaps are 2 feet in length, such that if the suspension is compressed, there is notable change in steering geometry (the wheels move if you bounce the car), and I did find that there are some peugeots, and more notably vauxhall racks that are like this, I do wonder what the steering geometry was like there!!

Hope that helps anyone