What steel are they usually forged from? 4340 Does not like to be welded and not stress relieved after. Ago
Aussie road racers, 1950's. The one in front is Hudson-based, the one behind is a 120 series Jaguar based racer. I'll see if I can find another pic of Frank's, it was called the SO-CAL SPECIAL in its day. Cheers, Glen.
Paul, here's another one, this one's based on a mid 30's Hudson also, but fully restored. I suspect this is what Aussie blokes who wanted to go fast did rather than hot rodding at this time. Cheers, Glen.
And here's the full story on the So-Cal Special, including the correct engine that was swapped in place of the sidey, and the story of the broken pitman arm, all from Frank's daughter, and a number of era pictures of the special, and the sort of road racing done in Australia in the 50's and 60's. http://www.motormarques.com/community/drivers-and-cars/item/569-so-cal Cheers, Glen.
Years ago I wanted to change the geometry of my pitman arm. A good friend worked in management at Lincoln Electric and he gave the project to the engineers at Lincoln. They cut, welded, heat treated and xrayed the arm and said it would be stronger than original. These were real pros. The first time I took the car out it broke and I ran into a telephone pole. Fortunately I was able to slow the car down and didn't kill myself. If this doesn't convince you then you must have a death wish.
Ok if you cant weld them how would you make the tapered internal splines if someone wanted to make one and what would you make one out of.
My rock rig has an arm I welded. It has 199,000 miles on it. If that doesn't convince you, then you probably understand that the plural of anecdote is not data.
The problem here is your good friend gave it to the engineers, not a welder. All the production pitman arms I've ever worked/welded on were forged low carbon steel, not at all difficult to weld.
Question, if welded pitman arms are unsafe where do welded ujoints to shafts fall in the safety scope?
Thumbs up, or thumbs down. I also would like to hear more about the one that failed the the Lincoln "experts" did. I have personally cut and welded, or otherwise modified more pitman arms that the number of failures indicated in this thread, with zero failures.
This. There are probably thousands of welded parts on steering and suspension components in use on the street and in highly abusive off road race vehicles. Bottom line if you are a competent welder you will be fine. Bunch of panic merchants on here .
Now come on Voodoo, my son is an engineer at Lincoln Welding. The first year he worked there out of college, he trained for a full year in every department to get experience. He had to go thru the complete welding school and pass all the out of position manual welding, in all forms of welding. Then they put him him in his engineering job. Ago
Bingo. I had a couple that were welded on stock cars which took quite a bit of abuse. I did all the cutting, fittting and mock up, but had a greatly experienced welder stitch it up. Once it was completed, cleaned up and painted, it looked like new. Bob
There are no "failures" in steering setups if DD rod is correctly utilized with Borgeson-type u-joints. There is no welding. The ONLY way to go.
I've welded pitman arms, spindles and steering shafts. I made lengthened VW bug ball joint trailing arms out of two sets. Took it out and beat the hell out of it on and off road. Never failed. I am not a certified welder but did spend the night at a Holiday Inn Express last night.
I'm curious to how many were done in the past with stick or ox/ gas and still worked,i would guess that was old school though . I watch my friend narrow a dodge axle and stick weld it back together when everyone said it would not hold up, i guess he proved them wrong, it's still under the car after almost 50 years
Another option I seem to read on here once in a while, is recruiting the services of an automotive blacksmith.......although this seems prevalent mostly in Europe and down under. andydodge has done this I believe.
As the old HAMB metallurgist, welded pitman arm can be fine. Key word "can" as in the welding technique and especially the pitman arm base material alloy. Most are low carbon steel and no problems welding by almost any technique. It is the higher alloy and specifically higher carbon that can mess you up. Proper weld prep and full penetration are required for any. Some of the harder to weld alloys need pre-heat and post-heat. Slow cooling is always good. The big problem is knowing what the base material is before you start. You can get it checked (money...), you can do a crude spark test to get an idea which is effective if you know how to do it. Would I do it on my own vehicles? Yes, I would but I also would be careful to figure out the material so I could be assured of the right welding process.
I retired from a steel mill and watched many a good spark testers save the comp. ass on mixed bundles of steel. Many people would be surprised by what a good spark tester can tell you about the type of steel and compounds that are in it just from the spark, the big thing is he cant be color blind
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