Tie rod bar clearance?

I have been reading in other post issues with the tie rod bar resting on top of the wish bones and wanted some of your opinion on what you have done to take care of this issue. I was planning to cut a portion of the wish bones to give it enough room for the tie rod bar to travel side to side and not rubbing anymore. Let me hear your what you have done.

Thanks
Frenchy

 

Heat the steering arm and bend it up a 1/4" or so.

 

Is there enuff room to flip it to the top side ??

 

Heat and bend (looks better) or notch the bones. I've seen it done both ways.
Make sure you have enough tie rod to frame clearance either way.

 

Bend the steering arm a bit.

 

You could cut notches in the rod and cut out the bone enough to set a power steering gearbox in it (a very small one). ?

 

Hydraulic of course with very long gear....the Rube Goldberg method

 

WTF ?

 

Two hyd. steering boxes on the bones with matching teeth on the rod....haha...might work all the way to the ditch?

 

I did exactly what your wanting to do because the steering arms were chromed and I couldn't heat them without redoing the chrome. The wishbones were in need af repair anyway.

 

I like FATBOYS answer. Why not just turn the tie rod over to insert from the top??

Easy to put a 7* taper half way in the arms.

 

This might work, but sometimes top mounting puts the tie rod too close to the frame rails or (in my case) the harmonic balancer.
One thing to remember, the tie rod and the wishbones move up and down in conjunction with each other so very little clearance is needed. That being said, cycle the steering from lock to lock because as the tie rod moves side to side it also moves front to back and the clearances could change.

 

Well I decided the easiest way to do this was to have it on top see the pictures from my original post and pictures I took last night. Now I have plenty of space.

Thanks for all the help on this subject.

Frenchy

 

Frenchy, do you have the weight of the engine on the front end right now? The reason I ask is that if you don't, with the tie rod above the bones like that it's very easy to run out of suspension travel real quickly as soon as everything settles. I really recomend rethinking this one and just heating the arms to a dull red and bending them up just a 1/4" or so and going back to the tie rod down low. Better deal, trust me.

 

Tinman...That is the cleanest transition I've seen in a wishbone. (Graceful aesthetics whilst setting caster, then clearance for tie rod...Excellent!)

 

Thanks

I am going and wait as you mentioned until I have the engine and trans in place and than see where I am sitting and make these adjustments. Thanks for the heads up.

Frenchy

 

Damn nice attention to detail.

 

Thanks!

 

The other question I have how much of the thread from the tie rod end should be in the tie rod tube to be safe.

Frenchy

 

I like them whith just 2 or 3 threads showing past the jam nut, the closer the end is to the tube the stronger it will be.

 

Yup, harv nailed it! Harv, what happened to your avatar?

 

Yes bending the arm up seems to be the simplest solution. Avatar, looking for a new one.