steering rack

[judgie]

hello
building a 1303 for hillclimbs/sprint's and am thinking about changeing to a steering rack but which one?any one know the side to side travel of a stock 03 rack?have a list of a few uk cars rwd escort,sunbeam lotus etc high ratio racks are esay to come by so thought about one of them.
cheers rob

[Bruce2]

I have a friend who installed the rack from a Scirocco in his Karmann Ghia. I don't know what year it was from.
When you are looking at racks, try to find one that has really long tie rods that attach at the center rather than at the ends. Long tie rods reduce bump steer.

[DORIGTT]

Hey Bruce2,

How did it work for your friend? Would you be able to supply any pics or any related information on the swap? That would definately be something I would be interested in because the Scirocco and Rabbit racks have a reduced ratio gear kit to reduce turns lock to lock but still retain the advantage of being relatively inexpensive.

Thanks in advance.

[Bruce2]

His car was featured in the Sept 2001 of hotVWs. Its the car on the cover.
I don't know too much about it since he sold the car soon after that. I do remember that he first cut a trough in the tunnel/frame head for the rack to sit down in. Then when he got the car all together he realised it was way too low and that he didn't need to cut the frame head at all.
He pretty well had to go with a rack since his beam was narrowed 7". This would have made the stock left tie rod super short, causing horrible bump steer. Plus when you narrow a beam that much, there is nowhere to put the steering box.
Read this discussion:
http://www.shoptalkforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=14564