fbekholden.com

That looks pretty close Jay, ideally the pivot point for the tie rod would be in line with an imaginary line run through the top and bottom wishbone inner pivot centreline.
if you only have 2mm of deflection through the front suspensdions arc of travel it is pretty well spot on

Hi Jay,

Did you check your bump steer with your brakes locked on, slight movement up and down will show a couple of mm either way,to measure bump steer correctly you need at least 4 inches of travel, with the static ride height pretty much mid point.
The biggest issue with rack fitment to the Holden front end is that it is banana'ed, the wishbone pivots are not straight in travel but are angular looking from front to back. so what most would assume correct is way off. As Blacky pointed out, the line of plane is from upper pivot to lower wishbone pivot, but you also have to take in the angular consideration which is always overlooked.
When Rod Hadfield did his conversions back in the day, his were a good conversion for average bump and ackerman geometry not perfect but entirely exceptable so far as rack conversions went, for that type of front end.
Lots of modifiers tried and employed better forms of rack adaptation, and I'm not putting a downer on you here Jay but I have personally improved on what has been done in some form or another, like the fitment of LC/LJ racks. They have worked but not that well, the added weight of a V8 engine alone will be one factor in accelerated wear and play, pivot points and steering arms make the road load heavy and the LJ rack is of light weight, unless bushes have changed wear will be a big issue, I have also witnessed rack bend and tightness. Hence why the UC rack was better the same with the Cortina racks, Much larger rack bushes and rack shafts, to take much more weight over the front.
I had a Mazda RX4 installed a 229 chev V6 and fitted a Laser rear rack to it (due to it being compact)steered quite well, nearly zero bump steer and ackerman was good static, but wore tyres out, later found out it was the rack bending under load.
I learnt lots from that conversion................

But like the green and the red before, this one is another class build, you should be proud of you achievements, a little bloke in a little shed restoring outstanding vehicles.

Cheers John

Thanks for the info and kind comments John I value and respect your input mate
the whole HR front has been rebuilt so componets should be good for a few k's
I guess having not done one of these rack conversions before it is
a trial and error situation for me ive tried to gather as much info as I could and sort the
true from false I do think people can over complicate things and bambosal themselves
with to much information sometimes
you just cant buy experience when it comes to modifying cars like your self and Mick and others that ive spoken to
your knowledge is priceless
so will see how this rack performs under load as far as movement and strength go's
with the weight for the lc lj rack not taking the weight of the v8 the 253 is suppose to be only 41kg heaver then the 202 that came out in the lc lj (thats less then the weight of a adult passenger)
so I guess the extra weight spred over the crossmember and stiffened suspension should be able to take the extra force without to much drama's

My old man has a 39 sloper hot rod with a v8 it has a little Austin or some pommy rackn pinion steering in it and has been in the car for 30yrs and it drives
and steers great no worries about weight of the v8
as ive said I will see how the rack go's and will go from there

and your due to put up some pics John you must have that car repaired by now mate hows she going

got a fuel tank off Trev cleaned it up got the couple of dents out
with a dent puller suction cap type and then got it nice and smooth
and painted it gloss black as per rest of the under body this tank will be replaced
eventually by a bigger one that is being made slowly










also got the rear brakes sorted i used hq backing plates and brakes onto the lc lj diff wich gives me bigger rear brakes
i made the hole in the hq backing plate larger to go over the bearing and used ht drums to retain the old holden bolt patern as per Torana axel
plenty of clearance between the wheel cylinder and axel much more then the ht backing plate
hq ht brakes are pretty much interchangeable so this gives me ht front and rear matching brakes and will a ht master cylinder aswell
there is a how to do this in the brakes section i posted earlier with more pics

cleaned and painted up the brake parts/ backing plates just waiting for the new cylinders and shoes to
come as they sent me front ones instead of rear ones
also repainted the front guard I scratched when I was putting the seat in the red wagon
still need to put the clear on it but because it got to cold
and put some new tyres on the new cragars went with 205 65 15 they fill up the big front guards and will look even better once its lowered a touch
pics

Quality work Jay!

Easily finished by Cowra...see you there mate!

Greay work as always from you Jay.

Thanks guys
as for the Nats stew yep the pressure is on

Hey Jas, the wagons really looking great. I've got the Green machine on the road, just got to get some miles
On her before I am confident she is Natworthy. I'll drop in one way or the other to see this blue wagon, it's very cool.

Thanks Tony that's great news about the green machine well done mate
not that confident that I will get to the nats but your more then welcome to drop in mate
be good to see you and the old girl with the new additions just point her in the right direction
she knows the way home

Rear brakes all together and on
all new HT shoes cylinders and drums HQ backing plate on the lc lj torana diff

Looks great Jay,
hope to see this at the Nats
Are HT brakes the same as HQ ?
Cheers Rob

Hi Rob thanks mate
there very close mate I used all the springs and clips from the HQ brakes I brought + backing plates then used
the HT shoes and cylinders
the HT shoes have no cut out for the cylinder push rods so the just mate up flush to the ht cylinder
where the hq shoes have the cut out because they have longer little push rods that go into the wheel cylinder
I chose to use the ht shoes and cylinders because im running HT front calipers and rotors and master cylinder
this way I have all matching brakes
but in theory you could run hq blank rotors redrilled to old holden pattern and hq calipers up front and you could fit up hq brakes on the rear
with the ht drum to keep the old stud pattern and have matching brakes all round and in theory you shouldn't need a expensive brake test for engineering
but that would depend on the engineer

Hey Jay,

I'm just popping up to say I've been following this build and that I really admire your attention to detail. I'm on a similar trip with my own EK... Also: I share your affection for the factory look of HT-HG era 253/308 motors, with no pollution gear and that swinging 60's aircleaner decal. Really enjoyed dressing up the 308 I had in my HT Monaro similarly. This will suit your car nicely
Look forward to seeing it done, hope the run to the flag is smooth for you mate.

Joe

Thanks Joe