Steering rack boot equivilents?

[Alex]

My steering rack travels through the chassis - the boot doesn't last too long before being torn to shreds.

Is there such a thing as a ?cap? that only protects the very end (around the rack) as opposed to a boot that is several inches long?

Short of that the only way I can see to solve my issue is to cut a really big f'n hole in the chassis or boots become wear items every few months?

 

[Randy V]

Alex, I don't have a perfect solution as I have the same problem as you. However, I had started to make a boot retainer that essentially seals the boot on the outside of the tub. Still at full lock, it did compress the boot too far so, like you, I am looking for the correct answer.

 

[Alex]

Here's my current noodled up thought (which will probably fail once I study the steering rack in greater detail) :

Get a tube that's the same diameter as the main body of the steering rack and cut a relief at the end of if to make it slip fit.

Slide it onto the rack and clamp it in place (t-bolt)

The tube is roughly 5'' long, same diameter as rack main body, and exists out of the chassis. About 1/2'' past the end of the chassis clamp the rubber steering boot onto it and then zip tie onto the inner tie rod

The only reason I can see this as a fail is because of the inner tie rod can move around a lot to accomodate suspension travel and you end up binding it against the tube (i.e., once the main body of the rack ends it needs that empty space in order to have full movement capability)

To get around that problem I thought of instead of using a rigid tube to extend, use a heater hose. Clamp one end of heater hose onto the steering rack, then the other end machine a ring that goes inside the heater hose (for rigidity) and clamp the rubber boot onto the heater hose (and zip tie othe rend onto inner tie rod).

Of course once I start talking about clamping heater hoses onto steering racks I begin to question myself :uneasy:

edit: I was looking at gt40 pictures and it seems like you guys also have the steering rack boot coming out through the chassis - surely everybody has an issue with boot life? The holes in my chassis are smooth so it's not like my boots are rubbing on sharp edges.

 

[Rick Muck- Mark IV]

Here's my current noodled up thought (which will probably fail once I study the steering rack in greater detail) :

Get a tube that's the same diameter as the main body of the steering rack and cut a relief at the end of if to make it slip fit.

Slide it onto the rack and clamp it in place (t-bolt)

The tube is roughly 5'' long, same diameter as rack main body, and exists out of the chassis. About 1/2'' past the end of the chassis clamp the rubber steering boot onto it and then zip tie onto the inner tie rod

The only reason I can see this as a fail is because of the inner tie rod can move around a lot to accomodate suspension travel and you end up binding it against the tube (i.e., once the main body of the rack ends it needs that empty space in order to have full movement capability)

To get around that problem I thought of instead of using a rigid tube to extend, use a heater hose. Clamp one end of heater hose onto the steering rack, then the other end machine a ring that goes inside the heater hose (for rigidity) and clamp the rubber boot onto the heater hose (and zip tie othe rend onto inner tie rod).

Of course once I start talking about clamping heater hoses onto steering racks I begin to question myself :uneasy:

edit: I was looking at gt40 pictures and it seems like you guys also have the steering rack boot coming out through the chassis - surely everybody has an issue with boot life? The holes in my chassis are smooth so it's not like my boots are rubbing on sharp edges.

The original GT40 design has the rack outside of the tub and no edges/holes to foul the rack boots. I question the design that has the rack boots interfering with the chassis. It seems to me to be fated to failure to have a flexible rubber/soft part in contact with metal in a moving manner.

 

[Randy V]

Perhaps PVC tubing as a sleeve?

Here's an older picture of my tub

 

[Cliff Beer]

I had the same problem on a different car many years ago. This was my solution, and it seemed to work well. Trying to describe this isn't easy but here goes.

Where the boot goes through the chassis wall I built a "cup" or a recessed inset (inset into the chassis wall) which extended inwards to the end of the rack. In other words, sort of an inset cone. I actually used a relatively thin wall (ie. sheet) stainless steel cone from a piece of industrial equipment and rolled a flange onto it at the appropriate depth so that the bottom of the cone just cleared the end of the rack and boot. Thus, the entire boot was exterior to the chassis.

Took some fitting and mucking around but worked well in the end.