Some ??? about Bump steer article...

What I'm referring to is HERE.


I see in the pictures that the '70 has the drag link (?) connected nearly at the passenger side knuckle, where as on mine, it's connected nearly at the middle. My question is are the bell crank and knucles the same as to allow me to do this conversion? Will the parts listed work for my '57?

I've got a spare set of knucles that I'm gonna convert to studs, and thought that this would be a good conversion while I'm at it.

 

Thad the difference from this article to your setup is yours is stock and he already did the 1 piece drag link conversion. He did his conversion and then later converted to the Heim joints where as you would be doing it all at once.
Oh and yes your stock parts are fine for this conversion.

 

Mike....Thanks for the concise answer. I'll be looking into this further.

Steve....I can appreciate that the Ross is lacking for some, but I'm looking to keep my Jeep as nearly stock as possible. That's to say, I really don't want to do any mods that can't easily be reversed. I don't doubt the saggi conversion is absolutely superior, but I have to believe that doing the heim joint conversion will help a lot as well. (just not as much as a saggi) FWIW, I'm not having troubles with bump steer, I just wanted to tighten/beef up a little.

Any other ideas/opinions?

 

Here is a photo of mine. Steve used the original dana 25/27 mine has a dana 30 swapped in with saginaw. Notice how flat the steering arm is compared to most. Mine has noi detectable bump steer.


Thad you could use the double hole knuckle on the passenger side. This will allow you to run a similar setup without Heim joints. I personally don't care for Heim joints on a steering application like this, but that is my own thing.

 

So spill it Mike, was it worthwhile? What improvements did you notice?

 

Fill me in on this please. What made you shy away from the heim joints?
What is a double hole knuckle?

 

The main reason I dislike Heim joints is the fact they are open so dirt and debris along with water are totally free to get in them.

The double hole knuckle is just what I said it is literally.
The stock cj setup was the only Jeep that used the particular steering we have. The other jeep models used a knuckle on the passenger side that was longer and had 2 holes cast in it. One was for the long tie rod to connect from side to side and the other hole was for the short tie rod to connect to either the steering box or bellcrank. All axles after the dana 30 was introduced have the 2 hole knuckle. This allows the toe in to stay the same all the time where as the stock set up changed the toe in every time you hit a bump or the suspension flexs.
If you want a picture of the 2 hole knuckle send me an email addy. The dana 44's of this era used a closed 2 hole knuckle and are compatible with the dana 25/27 axles. The friend (firefighter mike) got one from Nickmil for his dana 27.

 

The Wagoneer used a Dana 27 or closed-end 30 with a passenger side 2-hole knuckle until '74 when Jeep went to the open knuckle 44. I've been told that all the 2-hole closed-end knuckles are the same - Wagoneer and J-truck, 27, 30 and 44. The Jeepster Commando used a 2-hole tie rod end as seen in Steve's (w3srl) pics above. Either will work AFAIK.

Should be easy to find a 2-hole knuckle - the long-tube 27 and 30 are often upgraded for open knuckle Jeep 44s or Dodge 44/60s.

 

Sorry, I've been trailing in Panamint Valley... That article was about my efforts to tighten up my steering. It was a mess, sloppy ball joints and that "angle of the dangle" drag link, driving a freeway and hitting a bump was exciting. I tried to locate the major sources of the problem and fix them. There were two problems, slop and bump steer. With someone turing the steering wheel back and forth a few degrees, crawl around the frontside and locate where the steering movement is spent. I found a large rotation of my tie rod due to the three ball joint design; that had to go. Second was the angle of the drag link; that could stand a little improvement. I didn't find the Ross box to have a significant amount of slop. The bell crank and its connections had a little but that would have to wait until I could do things right and go Saganaw. I tried to keep what I did compatable with a future Saganaw upgrade. That was years ago, I haven't felt the need to do any more to the steering. There is no problem with dirt getting in the joints, they are far too tight and too smooth for anything to get inside. They do not rust.