The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area The HiPo Shop EPAS steering column with Howe 1.5 quickener

Thank you let's see if it works first. I just make it up as I go.

I put a hole in the upper tube so my horn wire will come out inside the turn signal mechanism. I also have my cruize control wires coming out so I altered the wire cover to accommodate the extra wires. I put relief cut in the depressions and hammered them flat. Then I leaded them shut. I started grinding and sanding the steering box smooth and matching the covers. It's almost like they didn't care what the outside looked like. I'm using a stainless steel hex head plug and didn't like the way it stuck up so far so I took a pipe tap and made it lower.

I finished grinding and sanding my parts and some parts were too rough and had voids in them so I put some PC-7 epoxy on it to fill the bad parts and voids and sanded it again. I then sprayed 2K epoxy primer/sealer on it and sanded it yet another time. I then installed the covers and trimmed the gaskets to match. On the threads of the "adjuster nut" I blued it and put a thin coating of "Sharkhide" on it. The stock tube I measured at 1.75" with .080 wall. My new DOM tube is 1.75" with 0.88 wall so I put it in the lathe and opened up the center at the top.so the upper bearing would fit.

I primed, based, and cleared my parts. I don't have a spray booth so I get some dirt in my paint. I just hit them with some 2000 grit to get the nubs out and a quick polish. I have some "Black Gold" wax that is amazing that I can put on in a couple of months. I realize the vast majority of this is never seen but it is good practice for me and I'm not normal. I did all of this with a $36 airbrush from Amazon with a .05 needle tip. I have trouble getting paint into the nooks and crannies with my turbine spray gun without getting too much in the areas around the detailed parts like the power motor. I'm sure it's just inexperience on my part. I got some texturing on the bigger parts. In retrospect I think I should have used the airbrush on the detailed parts and the cup gun on the larger parts. The column tubes came out really nice. I need to go through the ball nut and then I'm ready to assemble. I'm sick of tedious painting.

A big shout out to Jon G for saving my bacon and sending me a great link in the Driveline Forum on rebuilding my ball nut and steering box. https://www.stovebolt.com/ubbthread...gs-in-a-53-3100-steering-box#Post1586277 I had already rebuilt the steering box with bushings, bearings, and races but never addressed ball nut. There was about .005" play in the ball nut and the balls were about .0005" out of round. I polished the worm gear and replaced the balls (60) with new ones .280". I can't measure this small but I would say there is less than .001" play in the ball nut dry after rebuilding. The shaft on the sector gear was in nice shape with some deformation where the seal rides and a slight amount of burring where the adjuster bolt goes in. I stoned them down to 2000 grit and polished them on the buffer with stainless steel compound. I stayed away for the bearing surfaces as much as possible when stoning so as to not reduce the size. I relapsed and found myself re-polishing the polished ARP bolts. I made a temporary steering shaft to get the adjustment right and then installed the quickener.

I haven't got much done lately, Life and all. I changed all the bolts to ARP bolts because it's under the dash and nobody can see it. Of course I have to polish the polished bolts. I also put 304 stainless steel wire loom over the wires. Getting the pins out of the plugs was no fun. Once I got the first one out and saw how they worked it wasn't so bad. The loom is 1/2" wide and works like the old Chinese finger cuffs I played with as a kid. Here's a pro tip, When you live and work alone don't stick you fingers in both ends of a short piece. It will go up to about 3/4" and down to 3/16". I put it on and put a piece of heat shrink on one end. Then I pulled it tight and wrapped it to keep it tight and put the heat shrink on the other end. It was a pain in the butt. I got better at it and now it's not bad. Thank you for your time.

This has been pretty amazing to watch. If the rest of the truck looks as good as the steering mechanism, you're gonna win some trophies!

Thank you. This is a drag and drive build on my 53 3100 3 window that I bought in 1980.

What's that thing attached to the rear of the pumpkin? Does that counter the "squat" on takeoff or something?

Otto - That's a "quick gear change" axle. Rear cover encloses changeable gear sets to allow for different ratios depending on what is desired. Quicker take off, more top end speed, etc. Not sure if it's a "Franklin" or something else, but mick53 will be along soon to clarify.

OK. There's all kinds of stuff going on there. The gear changer is that chrome, finned housing thing?

What is the chrome lever? damper? thing on top of the pumpkin?

There is a lot going on there so I will apologize in advance for being so long. Other than my truck this has the most sentimental value of my parts. This is an old Frankland QC-80 Quick Change case. It was in a very good friend of mines dirt track car that I pitted for back in the 70's. The dirt track is long gone and he's a Country Western music star but we are still great friends. We were hanging out in his old shop one day and I saw it back in the corner. I had to have it. I have a 4:11 ring and pinion gear in it and that gives me 128 possible gear ratios from about 2:19 to 7:71. Several companies make these gears. Each gear set has 2 possibilities depending which on you put on top. They just slide on and the cover holds them in place. You can change them out in about 10 minutes. They are about $120 a set new and you can find them used for about $50. with the straight cut gears they have a whine to them. You can get angled cut gears that are quieter but they are not as strong. The lower input shaft is designed to be the weak link so it breaks first and it's easily changed. Shortly after buying it I was the project superintendent on a dry ice manufacturing plant in central Pennsylvania for about 9 months. It just happen to be about an hour from the Frankland factory. So I threw it in the truck and headed to the factory to see what they could do for me. They were extremely receptive to my plan. Thanks Fred. They kept the case and built everything else up to the HP I need. The flat black looking coating on it is some kind of thermal coating that makes it run significantly cooler. There is a Gleason Torson differential in it now and I have a spool for it. Depending If I'm drag racing or auto-crossing/street. The shiny piece hanging off the front is a Bicknell adjustable torque arm for axle wrap. It will mount in front to a crossmember. The rubber "biscuit" on the front is to absorb shock during launch. They come in different densities. The Frankland can handle the HP but they don't like the shock. A carbon fiber drive shaft also helps with the shock. I'm running leaf springs/coil overs and a pan hard bar on the rear. The coil overs are for ride height adjustment when pulling a drag and drive trailer. Wilwood was awesome in putting together the Nickle plated brake package for me and working with Frankland to get my width right. Thank you for your time.