Rack and Pinion problem 64 Comet

[Red Lehr]

Sometimes you think you have done all the homework before you do something and you still have major issues.....
I had an run of the mill Mustang II front end welded in my rolling chassis but now I'm finding out that the steering rack on the cross member is sitting too high and it's giving me fits on where to locate the FE engine. I mocked up a Canton 16-870 oil pan but I cut the bottom of the front section of the pan off.
I hate to mess with relocating the rack but I might not have a choice. If I try to go over the rack with the engine, I'll be too close to the front of the car.
I was just wondering if anyone else had this issue to deal with in the past.
Thanks for any help in advance !! I hope everyone is safe and healthy !
Red

[lavron]

Well I know my car is just a six and not an FE but I suffer from a really tall engine, my solution as terrible as it is, was to lower my cross member 2" and use a set 2" drop spindles, basically the car sits the same height (the center of the spindle does not move) the whole crossmember and rack are 2" lower.

Here is where I modded the cross member to drop down 2" by adding extensions to the ends.


You can see the frame notches in this picture. (upper left hand in picture)


The other thing is I had to cut 2" off of the upper control arm mounts.

That may or may not work for you depending on how low your car already is but it keeps everything in the right geometry and gives you an additional 2" of clearance under the motor but also 2" less ground clearance. The only other thing is I had to make a notch in the top of the frame for the rear upper control arm to clear (the main reason I installed it first with stock spindles was to avoid the notch, in the end it was not hard to make)

That was my experience and I still have tight clearance to the oil pan. And it would be nice to just lower the steering rack but I think that messes up the geometry, I am not sure if one could move the rack down and then mod the spindles so the tie rods attached the same amount lower, I think you might get into an issue with the tie rod hitting the lower control arm.

Good luck on getting it to work, I am sure there is a solution.

See Ya,
Mike

[vicegrip]

As long as the cross member is not in the way,lowering the rack should be no problem for a man with your fabricating talents.One problem I can see is an extreme angle of the steering linkage causing a bump steer problem.It ain't going to be a road race car so some bump steer is acceptable.These or ones like them that fit your application help out quite a bit.

https://www.speedwaymotors.com/QA1-BAX1 ... eb28_2020)

What Mike did would have been the answer but that ship has probably sailed unless you basically start from scratch.