quick ratio steering rack

[chrisofna]

Look near the bottom of the pic where the fat part (aka housing) of the knuckle is. It's only like 1/8-3/16" issue. The left has a longer housing but can be milled down to match the housing of the middle one. I haven't investigated this to see what all is different on the body or steering column or whathaveyou.

I did a body swap from carb to efi and I think I swapped in the efi column, we left the steering rack in cuz it was alright (carb) two years ago and did the rack swap recently.

OOOOOH, so that housing is binding up. Got it.

[chrisofna]

Chris, the Capri brake swap won't affect the steering effort. That is unless you're either running a very wide tire, or aren't using aspire LCAs, and therefore causing axle bind...

It's not binding, I just have to turn the wheel a lot, hahaha. It might just be me use to my Mazda2 steering though. I guess I should has elaborated when I said that. It's completely effortless.

Better analogy: It feels like I'm driving through a 1950s movie.

[walth]

Look near the bottom of the pic where the fat part (aka housing) of the knuckle is. It's only like 1/8-3/16" issue. The left has a longer housing but can be milled down to match the housing of the middle one. I haven't investigated this to see what all is different on the body or steering column or whathaveyou.

I did a body swap from carb to efi and I think I swapped in the efi column, we left the steering rack in cuz it was alright (carb) two years ago and did the rack swap recently.

[william]

What steering knuckle are you referring to, I have switched t early racks in all my efI cars because they don't wear out like the 90+ ones do and I didn't change anything when I swaped in the early rack .
I'm going to go to the rio rack soon, and I didn't know I would need anything different.
Sorry just looked at the pictures, I'm not sure if I used the u joint as I call it from the 90+,car when I swapped on the rack or not. Dose anyone have a measurement because I'm not sure what ones I have laying here . I didn't realize they where different so I never marked them

[FestYboy]

Chris, the Capri brake swap won't affect the steering effort. That is unless you're either running a very wide tire, or aren't using aspire LCAs, and therefore causing axle bind...

[chrisofna]

Sorry in advance for resurrecting this thread.

Thank goodness I found this information though. I have Capri knuckles and man it feels like I'm driving an 18 wheeler with the stock Festiva rack. I was going to go with the Kia Rio rack but I have an early car so I'm going to need the 90-93 Steering knuckle. It's crazy though because in the picture it doesn't look any longer.

[walth]

Comparison shot. See how left has more material than middle? Right is rio and probably 1/2" longer.


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[walth]

So, the moral of the story is, get a 90-93 knuckle to put a Rio rack in a festiva?
Thanks for the info Chris, I'm doing a Rio rack on an early car very soon and would have had to fuss with this too. I'll have to hunt down a late festy knuckle. I wonder what the Aspire knuckles looks like.

Exactly. Or machine the original one down as I think it would work. We actually got it in but then it wouldn't go any further. Didn't figure it out til we got to looking at the knuckles.

Can't find an image of the aspire knuckle


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[Advancedynamix]

So, the moral of the story is, get a 90-93 knuckle to put a Rio rack in a festiva?
Thanks for the info Chris, I'm doing a Rio rack on an early car very soon and would have had to fuss with this too. I'll have to hunt down a late festy knuckle. I wonder what the Aspire knuckles looks like.

[walth]

Skeeter and I just recently did the rio PS rack swap in my carby body car and found that the carby steering knuckle is 1/4" too long. Skeeter has a pic of the three next to each other. So....we put the rio one in and the tension was awful. So instead of taking the rack back out we decided to just move the steering column up. Used a small round rasp and elongated my upper steering column holes by maybe 1/4-3/8" and it has an extremely faint knock in the knuckle but I'll live with it for a while. Before elongating the holes, the steering was bound up really bad.

Point is, just don't use the rio knuckle that goes into the bottom of the steering column. Another reason we didn't fix it is cuz we were trying to get my car and Ben's car done in just a couple days for an autocross and we plain ran out of time.

I drove skeeter for a few days and forgot what my manual rack felt like when I got back in... but I know that I'll feel better on the AX courses with the better ratio rack. I read half of this thread before posting, but this is imo very important to have before doing AX. Better rack and suspension at the very least.

[mikemounlio]

Could you do a small electric pump with this rack to have power steering? Not that i want that tho. Could maybe even add in a steering quicken-er to really make the car able to turn! Able to turn and amount without removing hands off wheel and have it all powered!

I happen to have an audi parts car with a electric pump on it!

[mikemounlio]

Looks like O'Reilly Auto has the Festy PS rack for ~$150 remanufactured.
Line: MPP | Part # 101-0159

Looks like im gonna have to pick this up soon.

[Advancedynamix]

Festiva power rack is the quickest, and also the hardest to find.
For autocross you can increase your rake a bit. Too much rake makes these cars super nervous at high speeds, but the turn in is really quick and its easier to square off tight turns.

[mikemounlio]

Which rack gives the fastest turn in? I have a rio rack on Lucifer and love it. I need to get a rack for Overkill. Overkill will be my autocross car so it needs the best turn in i can get.

Might even do a custom adapter to quicken the steering after this coming season. IDK about all that tho. gotta see how she does 1st.

[FestYboy]

You need a taller tire, then add an LCA to chassis extension and taller struts. But what you gain in relative ground clearance, you loose at the LCA extension because of the desire to not change the geometry. Not to mention either having to add outer tie rod extensions or lowering the rack to keep the LCA to tie rod measurement parallel to keep bump steer at bay.