Manual steer tight near locks

[60jerry]

"63 Dart wagon manual steering. When trying to turn to the left or right lock, the effort required seems to quickly increase--a lot. It has been a few years since I rebuilt the front susension and steering and I'm not familiar with the details that front end guys know. I did install disc brakes at the same time. Am I chasing something that I don't need to chase?
Thanks
Jerry

 

[AJ/FormS]

No, IMO, you better hunt it down, like what if your brake hoses are too short....

 

[72bluNblu]

Definitely shouldn’t be happening. Get it up in the air and have someone turn the wheels while you look for interference.

Is this new after the suspension rebuild? Or did it suddenly appear?

 

[60jerry]

Definitely shouldn’t be happening. Get it up in the air and have someone turn the wheels while you look for interference.

Is this new after the suspension rebuild? Or did it suddenly appear?

Brake hoses are plenty long. I did the frontend work shortly after obtainig the car. It's going to be in the air soon.
Thanks guys

 

[Dave999]

how much positive castor do you have. if you set it up as per the factory book probably none or very little.
if you used the modern thinking and added some to get a more modern feeling, self centering action to the steering, or indeed the most you could, without positive camber. Then anywhere away from centre, the action of steering is LIFTING the front of the car, and this LIFT increases as you get closer to each lock. That creates a bigger effort necessary to steer. Check also, espcecially if you have increased wheel or tyre width (and diameter), that you are running the correct pressure. i run a relativly skinny 205 65 front tyre and a 16:1 manual steering box, the difference in parking speed steering from 26 PSI to 34 PSI is dramatic. you really need to know the weight of the car the designed pressure for the, now radial, and not cross ply tyres, and get a proper value. it will not be the value that the book states for your car with the orginal OEM tyres, it may be close but it won't be the same, in my case i end up at 34, tyre can take it for weight and speed rateing, car is light, yours may not be , a few psi higher aint gonna be an issue but might make all the differnce. but check weight and tyre rateing before going mad with the compressor.

if you jack it up and steer it to check, make sure upper bump stops work for the upper arms. if they are crushed and too soft, missing or the ends are snapped off, the suspension droop will be too much and you will over articulate the ball joints, the whole lot will bind as the studs hit the sides of the holes in the joints, it will feel horrible but is not really testing what you want to test, just illustrating you have a bump stop issue.

Dave

 

[72bluNblu]

how much positive castor do you have. if you set it up as per the factory book probably none or very little.
if you used the modern thinking and added some to get a more modern feeling, self centering action to the steering, or indeed the most you could, without positive camber. Then anywhere away from centre, the action of steering is LIFTING the front of the car, and this LIFT increases as you get closer to each lock. That creates a bigger effort necessary to steer. Check also, espcecially if you have increased wheel or tyre width (and diameter), that you are running the correct pressure. i run a relativly skinny 205 65 front tyre and a 16:1 manual steering box, the difference in parking speed steering from 26 PSI to 34 PSI is dramatic. you really need to know the weight of the car the designed pressure for the, now radial, and not cross ply tyres, and get a proper value. it will not be the value that the book states for your car with the orginal OEM tyres, it may be close but it won't be the same, in my case i end up at 34, tyre can take it for weight and speed rateing, car is light, yours may not be , a few psi higher aint gonna be an issue but might make all the differnce. but check weight and tyre rateing before going mad with the compressor.

if you jack it up and steer it to check, make sure upper bump stops work for the upper arms. if they are crushed and too soft, missing or the ends are snapped off, the suspension droop will be too much and you will over articulate the ball joints, the whole lot will bind as the studs hit the sides of the holes in the joints, it will feel horrible but is not really testing what you want to test, just illustrating you have a bump stop issue.

Dave

A little positive caster isn’t gonna do that. It’s true, the more positive caster you run the more you camber the tires when turning so you do get some lifting which increases turning effort. But I run 275/35/18’s up front with a 16:1 manual box and +6.5* of caster. Sure there’s more steering effort but it’s not a huge increase right at the end of the steering range. And my set up is pretty extreme, so I really doubt it’s a caster issue. Especially if he isn’t running adjustable tubular UCA’s, you just can’t get enough caster for that to be the problem.

It’s also super easy to eliminate, because with the tires off the ground it wouldn’t happen.

 

[60jerry]

When I had the alignment done, three or four years ago, the tech told me he got a bit over one degree of positive caster, so it sounds like I'll be getting the tires off the ground to find how that feels. I'm not a front end tech and I appreciate the onfo about the tires raising the car on turns. That hadn't occurred to me but it makes sense. With the small positive castor the car supposedly has it seems I might be looking for some other issue.
Thanks Dave l

how much positive castor do you have. if you set it up as per the factory book probably none or very little.
if you used the modern thinking and added some to get a more modern feeling, self centering action to the steering, or indeed the most you could, without positive camber. Then anywhere away from centre, the action of steering is LIFTING the front of the car, and this LIFT increases as you get closer to each lock. That creates a bigger effort necessary to steer. Check also, espcecially if you have increased wheel or tyre width (and diameter), that you are running the correct pressure. i run a relativly skinny 205 65 front tyre and a 16:1 manual steering box, the difference in parking speed steering from 26 PSI to 34 PSI is dramatic. you really need to know the weight of the car the designed pressure for the, now radial, and not cross ply tyres, and get a proper value. it will not be the value that the book states for your car with the orginal OEM tyres, it may be close but it won't be the same, in my case i end up at 34, tyre can take it for weight and speed rateing, car is light, yours may not be , a few psi higher aint gonna be an issue but might make all the differnce. but check weight and tyre rateing before going mad with the compressor.

if you jack it up and steer it to check, make sure upper bump stops work for the upper arms. if they are crushed and too soft, missing or the ends are snapped off, the suspension droop will be too much and you will over articulate the ball joints, the whole lot will bind as the studs hit the sides of the holes in the joints, it will feel horrible but is not really testing what you want to test, just illustrating you have a bump stop issue.

Dave

 

[60jerry]

A little positive caster isn’t gonna do that. It’s true, the more positive caster you run the more you camber the tires when turning so you do get some lifting which increases turning effort. But I run 275/35/18’s up front with a 16:1 manual box and +6.5* of caster. Sure there’s more steering effort but it’s not a huge increase right at the end of the steering range. And my set up is pretty extreme, so I really doubt it’s a caster issue. Especially if he isn’t running adjustable tubular UCA’s, you just can’t get enough caster for that to be the problem.

It’s also super easy to eliminate, because with the tires off the ground it wouldn’t happen.

Thanks 72blu. It does appear that there is some other problem that I hope I find with the car in the air. If nothing is obvious to me it'll be time for younger eyes. I turn 77 this month and I notice some low-light issues and body creaking these days.
Jerry

 

[72bluNblu]

When I had the alignment done, three or four years ago, the tech told me he got a bit over one degree of positive caster, so it sounds like I'll be getting the tires off the ground to find how that feels. I'm not a front end tech and I appreciate the onfo about the tires raising the car on turns. That hadn't occurred to me but it makes sense. With the small positive castor the car supposedly has it seems I might be looking for some other issue.
Thanks Dave l

With stock control arms and bushings it's unlikely you'll ever get more than about +2.5° of caster, usually less. A "bit over" +1° would match up with a stock rebuild using non-offset bushings and the alignment not maximized for caster. The caster is absolutely NOT your problem. In fact, if you're running radial tires that's not really even enough positive caster. Using the factory alignment specs with radial tires is a big mistake, the factory specs were for bias plys which are different in their construction and handling. +1° caster with radials will feel like driving a shopping cart.

With radials these are the specs you want

 

[60jerry]

With stock control arms and bushings it's unlikely you'll ever get more than about +2.5° of caster, usually less. A "bit over" +1° would match up with a stock rebuild using non-offset bushings and the alignment not maximized for caster. The caster is absolutely NOT your problem. In fact, if you're running radial tires that's not really even enough positive caster. Using the factory alignment specs with radial tires is a big mistake, the factory specs were for bias plys which are different in their construction and handling. +1° caster with radials will feel like driving a shopping cart.

With radials these are the specs you want
View attachment 1715925279

Thanks 72. That chart deserves to be copied and put in my Mopar info stash.
Jerry