Technical Sorry for the stupid question.....

There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers. If you don't ask, you don't learn. None of us were born with knowledge. We learned as we grew.

 

PM sent, didn't want to hi jack the thread

 

No wonder my size 13ew feet don't fit! Even on a car as big as my Lincoln, the factory pedals were close, and the seat, at the full rear position was to far forward for my legs, and I'm only 5'11". I ended up putting my hanging brake pedal to the left of the steering column to get foot room between the brake and gas pedals, and made an adapter to move my seat back 3". Now I fit in pretty well....

 

Dwarf feet in comparison to my 13w shoes, coupled with my 6'2" height and 300lb fat ass. The love for hotrods is often a letdown for me.

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My 8 1/2 shoes work just great with my three pedals in my 3 window 32. I guess some of us are just lucky!

 

It seems bit like a broken record ,and even though you are looking at a 32 , it wouldn't hurt to get a hold of theBishop/Tardel book. Mike Bishop is here on the HAMB
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/members/av8.26/

 

Snap to drive w/o shoes
View attachment 3409194

 

Ok so you guys with 32's and 3 pedals, could you please tell us a little about your setup? Mine is chassis engineering center crossmember and chassis engineering pedals. And a 40 or so ford column.

 

Flathead arm - The boys have ya covered with the info. But here's a couple of pix grabbed from the Speedway site.
Top pic is traditional steering. The box shown is diagramatic, Schroder setups are the way, I'm told.
Bottom pic is cross steering, like my setup on the straight axle on the '57.

 

Then you will have plenty of room for the drag link. The Buick in the photo is one of the worst case scenarios as the ports are high and the header mounting face is vertical, putting the pipes relatively high.

Roo

 

Here's another example of side steering...

 

As you continue to investigate the cowl steering you will find that the concept was taken from open wheel sprint car designs. many of the steering boxes are designed with a very fast steering ratio to reduce the amount of steering wheel movement required by drivers. because of the steering ratio in the cowl type boxes they are not recommended for street application, however there are many standard steering boxes that lend themselves nicely to modification to be used as cowl boxes.
Here is a nice thread on using a later 70's Ford steering box: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/cowl-steering-first-time.996254/

The Dodge A body is another candidate: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/dodge-mopar-steering-box-for-cowl-steer.980039/

Here is a member who modifies and sells F100 boxes converted for cowl steering: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/f-100-cowl-steering-box.1043468/

Also research what the Rolling Bones guys have done in the past, there have been a lot of cowl steering cars come out of their shop. Much of their work is well documented and a lot of ideas there

 

If you want comfort.... wrong type of build. That said, I`m 6`5`and drive a chopped coupe.

 

I hope you're ready for the sticker shock, Schroeder steering gears are north of $800.00 and you have to engineer out the mounts before calling them to place an order because they are built per application. Add another $850.00 if you opt for the 16:1 steering ratio. If you run the 6:1 or 8:1 your steering speed is 1 turn of the steering wheel lock to lock and forget about trying to turn if you're stopped. I put a Schroeder in the track T in my avatar. I found it to be ok on the road but for someone who is new to this style car you'll probably hate it.

 

My granddad was an officer in the army when they still had height requirements. he had to stretch to stand 5'3". he wore a size 9 boot because as he put it he had big feet.

 

If you look closely at the pictures, the guys with a lot of "feet" room have little or no trans tunnel in the floor, and little or no trans hump in the firewall.
How the motor sits in the chassis and how the body sits on the frame will have a huge effect on how much the transmission hump and drive shaft tunnel intrude on the pedal floor space. The extra space is not limited completely by the steering column and the pedals. A flat firewall and a flat floor give you a lot of room to spread the pedals out, especially if the pedals are hanging. Gene

 

Very true on engine placement. Trial fit , trial fit, trial fit everything. You need all your components gathered to get what you want. I think very experienced builders are always trying different arrangements all the time..

 

I used an early 70s (I believe) BMW 2002 steering box for my cowl steering. It came with pretty much everything to make it work....and it was $60!! I have yet to encounter bump steer even though it doesn't have the much vaunted "parallel geometry".




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This is the thing I like about Hot Rods; there is nothing that doesn't fit!

It's the sense of; I got an angel grinder, a torch and a weld, what do you mean by it doesn't fit!!

There is tutorials for most things (juice brakes on old spindles, how to locate front axle, how do I set up rearend etc) but there is bin for seating position.
Because it's so individual, that you have to custom fabricate it! It's nice to have multiple parts to swap in, shifter, Column, steering wheels, pedal assemble, seats etc.

Make sure your frame is good (square, level and rigid), tack in motor mounts, place body on frame, place motor on mounts(supported), place a stock seat in stock location, place pedals in stock location, place steering column I stock location and mount headers of choice in in there right location and put ads in seat, and go through the motions! Use plenty of c-clamps!!!

And the you move all items above around in small circles from there starting point, change column if need, add or remove seat cushion after how you fit.
Bent leavers/Rods/shifter etc.

And when you think you got it, find a Brother/Friend someone on the same size as yourself, and go straight to the BELCOM part of the project.

Put him in the seat, and tell him to go through the motions of driving, including sitting relaxed in the seat with forearm on door top.
BELCOM stands for
BEer (give on to test dummy too, if you don't drink root beer works too), Lawn Chair and
Old Music, and relax!
Look at all the little details of the rod, does it look like 1954 (your year of choice) all over again, does lines flow, does driver sit in car (apposed to sitting on it).

If it fits, good for you, if not, do it all over again!
You most to be satisfied with driving position!!!!
NOT just content!

And BELCOM has to be applied after every build session so you end up with a proper car, not a clown car!

 

And FYI, there is stupid questions, mostly do to attitude and Ignorance by the asker.

But this question is by no means even remotely close to being stupid, it's well thought out, well formulated, just the right amount of pics, and the humble approach to asking a question,
Makes this one of the best FNG question in a long time!!!

And if you are new to this stuff, and need advice, fell free to ask.
And for the more straight forward hands on items I can recommend

Looking up @Dennis lazy thread about his truck build. Shit load of good info on all the small items.

There is a very long thread (search bucket of ugly), where [USER=]@need[louvers?/USER] Talk about how to look at things and spot wrong, and how to fine it.

And there is a thread by @JimSibley
What is a hot rod

It's not mandatory reading like the Dennis lazy build thread, but it shows something about how wide the boundaries of traditional hot rod goes, and it get you introduced to some of the "usual suspects" of the forum.

 

I've never like any cowel steering,its far better to design your rod with good engineering for streetdriving then copy poor design,it dosen't matter how many times its been done wrong,its still wrong with lots of bumpsteer. Cowelsteering nearly always is done badly=Having a sign on the side of your rod saying"this builder has no idea what he's doing" There are some,very very few that got cowel steering set up with low or even good bump steer. Those that did it right,have the steering rod end of boxpitman arm very close to back rodend of front axlebone. The wrong set up we see most of the time is way above that point. Beside braking up the nice smooth look of a cowel with a ugly hole an crap sticking out of it,most poorly done cowel steering makes the car jump around some side to side with each bump big enough to move the front axle up an down more then an in. or so. You can be a little above the line in drewing, but at about 6in. or more steering gets messy in bumps an control really goes away.

 

Thanks Dana, I always thought the same thing, but didn't know how to say it without coming off wrong. You did a wonderful job.

However there are no stupid questions. I just ask why anyone would want to put side steering on a beautiful hot rod. Just my 2 bucks...

 

Montanal "However there are no stupid questions. I just ask why anyone would want to put side steering on a beautiful hot rod. Just my 2 bucks..."
Ture,no stuipe Q's. As to why,each has there own ideas,but most often I hear,"They did it that way",the fail there is not knowing better,hotrodding was an is about faster,better,not about copying poor engineering,but in some cases copying well done engineering gain. Always very smart to ask by anyone that wounders why. Lots of cool info by HAMBer

 

It's funny how people look at the same thing, and come to a different conclusion!!!

To me the is three way to go about a solution, there is the right way, the wrong way and my way

I see no reason why cowl steer can't work!! But I also see cowl steer that do not work, and that can only be traced back to pour workmanship or not planning/studying ahead!!!

So you can't blame cowl steer, when someone fails!!!!
A bad cowl steer and worse then a badly set up conventional setup!!! Not any better when set up right

But what really annoys me, is the look you get when you install a Fad T bucket style steering mast set up in a otherwise perfectly setup hot rod.
That should to me go down in history as the ugliest solution to an simple problem.
But to each his own!

Sorry if I offended the 5mio bucket owners in the world, I was making a point and not lashing out at anyone!!

 

did somebody say Cowel steering?

 

Here's mine 29 roadster f1 box 4 speed home made junk with 25 years of gear jamming. Got to ware your Vans.