As my build is quite different it has a very narrow on the front. I need a rack around 13-14 inches between the inner tierods. Being in the Canada I have not found anything that will work and I found that the cast that my rack is made of (casing) appears to be non weldable -even with tig(according to the welding/machine shop I took it to). I have found the racks available for sand rails or buggies are almost a perfect size and the rack movement is close enough on one of them. They are only 1.5 turns lock to lock. Aside from not knowing if that is legal in a road car I am wondering if it would be to twitchy for a road car and require a lot of arm strengh to drive aka can my wife drive it without alot of strain.
My cars probably going to end up around 1400-1500 lbs.
Dale

1.5 turns is probably a bit quick. I have a 1 turn rack in my autograss car but I wouldn't like to drive it on the road (very far anyway)

I would say try and find a car rack that you can shorten. Some cars in the US must have a steel cased rack, a lot of the Ford Sierra's over here did, this is dead easy to shorten.

Failing that you could get a rack made. The one in my autograsser is about the dimensions that you describe, and an engineering company over here fabricates those from scratch (including cutting the rack and pinion gears) and sells them for £150 a time, so not toooo expensive?

I have considered making a casing for the rack gears I have which might be doable as I have alread cut and welded the main gear.
Dale

Dale, I have one of those quick buggy racks.....on my buggy of all places...

I think if you could tolerate it a little heavy for parking, then it could be OK....

Thanks for the info Alan, any idea how much the front of your buggy weighs and your wheelbase of it is, I am guessing around 600-700 lbs one the front of my car and a long wheelbase of 105 inches so it would not be too twitchy as a short car. Is it one of the 14 inch racks and is it tight no wondering?. And last question is your buggy street legal?
Dale

Good questions.

Well I can lift the front off the ground so I can't imagine much more than 200 pounds on the front.
Wheelbase is about 96".
Not sure about the rack size.....some pics here....clicky for piccy

No, definitely not street legal...it's a single seat off-road racer.

HTH

Dale.

I u2u'd you about a likely looking rack, but it turns out that it's probably 17.25". It's a nice-looking one, though; maybe contact the mfr. about shortening possibilities?

Pete

Edited to remove ignorant comments about shortening possibilities

[Edited on 20/5/04 by pbura]
Rescued attachment f3_1_b.jpg

A Porsche rack????

Dale,

MK SportsCars who shorten racks for the MK Indy don't weld the casing back together. They just turn the ends down and then sleeve it.

Someone on here will have pictures!

HTH,

James

EDIT: Here's picture from Bob's ever-useful archive:

http://www.locostbuilders.co.uk/photos.php?action=showphoto&photo=indy016.jpg

As you can see the hold it together with a piece of tube that slips over the turned-down ends of the casing.

[Edited on 20/5/04 by James]