65: Power steering, Granada brakes, Shelby drop, and bumpsteer- HOW?

[hunterhicks]

OK, no one seems to have a crazy way to fix this situation. Here is the story:

Those of you with a V8, power steering, and the granada brakes, you will know this story. but it gets uglier when you want to do whacky suspension improvements...

For those that don't know, the power steering driver's side tie rods are thicker, to accommodate the bend in the outer tie rod to clear the power steering valve. In addition, the granada tie rod end is smaller in diameter and fits the spindle, but does not match up to the fatter inner tie rod. If you use the old tie rod that fit the old spindles, it's business-end (where it attaches to the spindle) is too small, and does just flops around in there. You can buy a spacer, which I have and not installed yet (from mustang steve (http://www.mustangsteve.com/tierodbushings.html), or you can buy a $80 specialized tie rod from mustang's plus, or you can do the worst thing- what I did- 'resize' the adjustment sleeve... which has worked very well, strangely. no death yet.

This is what I have work with, and would like to keep, if possible:
65 convertible, 289 A-Code, tri-y headers (with power steering ram lowerer), power steering, power granada disk brakes, 620# springs, KYB adjustable shocks. Everything else is stock-ish, rubber, etc.

I wanted to use the GW neg roll system (new control arms), and add a bumpsteer setup too. But I've read that GW a-arms don't work with the granada spindles (they bind- story on gt350clone.com)- so I plan to go the 'free' Shelby route.

My problem: I want to use a bumpsteer kit-either the Baer of the Dr. Gas (found on mustangsplus.com)

-One thought is to order two bumpsteer kits, one that can accomidate the 'fat' power steering tie rod, and one regular kit, that fits the pass. side- (wihch is the same as the manual steering, & not an issue) BUT, I don't think they make a 'fat' bumpsteer kit. I don't know if they do- anyone?
-another crazy thought is to somehow reduce the size of the P/S inner tie rod- cutting the threads down- I'm going to look into machine shops around here to see if this is possible
-can always go back to the original spindles and spend another fortune on disk brakes.
-?

Any pointers or suggestions on lowering & bumpsteer-ing a 65-66 with P/S and Granada brakes?


Thanks!
hunter

 

[jmenke]

I am using the Dr Gas (Pro Motorsports) bumpsteer on my 66 Mustang with PS granada discs.
Note that I converted to TCP power rack about 4 years ago and had to change the driver side outer tie rod to a manual part, but in both cases (stock PS and TCP PS) I used the stock Mustang tie rods. The Dr Gas (Pro Motorsports) bump steer kit has a saddle that wraps around the spindle arm and a bolt that goes into the hole the tie rod used to go into. The tie rod goes into a new hole in the bumpsteer block. There are positive lock set screws to cinch everything up. You don't need to do anything to your tie rod ends, or buy wedges, or special rod ends to make the Granada parts work with the stock PS Mustang rods with their system (at least the one I purchased in 1997) for a 1966 Mustang.

I can't answer any questions relating to the upper arms. When my car was lowered, I used the Pro Motorsports lowering and neg wedge kits with the stock upper arm. In my opinion, this lowered the car too much, and I have taken the wedge kit and lowering kit out, but kept the 1" lowering Eibach springs.

 

[66 BLAKE 96]

I'm curious about this one too. Surely there are enough P/S cars with Granadas that somebody has worked out this mess.