S.I. Quick Steering Arms

[mjeansonne]

In the January 2010
Turning Wheels on page 55, S.I. advertises what it calls 'Quick Steering Arms'. The '62 Hawk has power steering and doesn't feel what I would call 'natural' in that there is no road feedback, light steering and perhaps the 'slowness' that S.I. describes in its add.

My question is: Has anyone installed these arms and what was the result? What should I expect?

While the price of $115.00 may be reasonable, if I purchase them it reduces the amount of money I can spend on other things for the car.[)] Not to mention the time and effort of installing them![)]



Laisez le bon temps roulez avec un Studebaker

[PackardV8]

1. The quick steering arms will reduce the number of steering wheel turns, lock to lock. However, the reduced leverage will sometimes also make the car feel more twitchy and wandering on the highway.
2. The Stude front suspension was designed before power steering, so it is impossible to adjust for enough positive caster to make it stable at highway speeds. This lack of caster is why it doesn't have the "natural" road feedback only found after another forty years of OEM engineering. The light steering was natural for all cars of the '50s-60s.
3. The linkage-type power steering was used because it was CASO-cheep to add on, but it is essentially a junk system. A complete system rebuild will make it less bad, but nothing can make it feel like a modern power box/rack system.
4. How many miles since the last complete rebuild? Most every Stude is overdue for front suspension and steering work. If your front suspension and steering system needs a rebuild, the quick steering arms will only exacerbate all the looseness.

thnx, jack vines

PackardV8

[buddymander]

Center your trunnions, set your camber, and elongate your upper aframe shaft mounting holes to get your caster to two degrees positive.

[Jerry Forrester]

quote:Originally posted by buddymander

Center your trunnions, set your camber, and elongate your upper aframe shaft mounting holes to get your caster to two degrees positive.

I did all that on Stella, the '55 Pres Cp.
It seemed to help a lot.

...............................................

I am in the process of getting parts and pieces gathered up for the May 2010 South Bend Swap meet. How about you?

Jerry Forrester
Forrester's Chrome
Douglasville, Georgia
Be sure to check out my eBay store
http://stores.ebay.com/CHROME-CHROME-CHROME
for your shiny Stude stuff.

More pix of Leo the '55 Pres HT here...http://tinyurl.com/2gj6cu

[rockne10]

I'm not a mechanic but I spend a lot of time with a couple of [u]very</u> good ones. After rebuilding the front suspension on my '53 and adding power steering, they both advised me to forego the quick steering arms. I'm happy without them.

[ivorydan]

I put them on my 64 Hawk. I felt a significant improvement in tightening up the steering.
It always is a tougher job than you anticipate, if you've not done it before. You'll want to make sure you mark where everything is before you start-then will still need to get it realigned by someone familiar with old fashioned alignment afterwards.
After 45-50 years, those old arms are pretty fussy about being removed!

[PackardV8]

quote:Center your trunnions, set your camber, and elongate your upper aframe shaft mounting holes to get your caster to two degrees positive.

Important caveat! If trying this modification on earlier cars, do it first without the springs installed and cycle the suspension to check for binding. Because of the inclination of early kingpins, a suspension with new parts will usually not have enough slack to allow that much rearward movement of the upper A-frame without causing binding. Because of the change in design, some later kingpins will go to two degrees positive without binding.

thnx, jack vines

PackardV8

[rickhmn]

I did not realize the caster was sooooo limited. What's the spec caster? On circle track cars I have run split caster with as much as 8 degrees on the right. would tipping the A arms with spacers have the same effect with less binding?

[buddymander]

Studebaker a-arms were built to twist. Even with standard alignment, there's no way running the trunnions off center isn't going to flex the a-arms. They're probably even twisted when centered. You could always put it together without springs, like Jack says, then after it's aligned, loosen the a-arm mounting bolts; top and bottom, and see if they twist. Then put spacers in to accommodate the difference. Anybody know of a commonly available spindle that has rear steer, studebaker bolt pattern, disc brakes and ball joints? I'd love to just cut off the a-arm ends and weld on ball joint bosses. I don't see how just twisting the a-arms would change alignment, tho. Course there would be some camber changes while turning, probably insignificant when compared to the difference in overall steering performance.