Power Steering, Master Cylinder, Parking Brake, and More (Part 7)

The Borgeson Z-Bar I purchased from OpenTracker would unfortunately not fit my vehicle due to my Patriot Clippster headers. I spent a few hours researching various types headers that might fit better but most came at a price tag of $700+ and I might still find they don't work and would need to rework my exhaust which is custom bent to fit my current headers. I even considered cable and hydraulic clutch setups but it was all way too much.

I contacted John at OpenTracker with a few pictures of the fitment in my vehicle. He indicated that the best option would be to just custom make a Z-bar that works in the space available. It had crossed my mind that one could be custom made but frankly just wanted a simpler solution it it existed. With this being my only option left, I decided to get to work.

I started by cutting the top part off the Z-bar as it was the only portion which was not shaped well for the new steering box. I placed it in the car and used some cardboard to make a new upper arm. I then used it to make a thin metal prototype to test it further. I then progressed to purchasing some 5/16" steel as that matched the size of the stock piece. In the picture below, you can see the OpenTracker model, my prototype, and then the piece of 5/16" metal that I ultimately used to make the Z-bar.

The newly created Z-bar is shown below with a few spot welds to hold it in place for testing. The template process worked well as the new piece fits perfectly. It looks like something someone built at home due to the boxy nature but I'm glad I have something that works. I won't say how many hours went into this piece as it took way longer than I expected. But it works and fits in the incredibly tight space.





This is a picture of my Z-bar installed for some rough test fit purposes... so rough I didn't even both to put the top link in the right way which is apparent by the firewall boot. However, putting it all together allowed me to cycle it through motion a few times to confirm everything fit together and there were no issues. You can see the damage to the fire wall from the leaking master cyclinder in this picture.

 


I need this piece to be very strong as I can't afford to have the welds break while I'm out driving around. For that reason, I'm going to find someone to finish weld this up for me. I'll then paint it with some height heat paint since it is so close to the exhaust.

Last thing is that I did today was dimple the header where it was making contact with the new steering box. The header is ceramic coated and the dimple cause the coating to come off. I'm going to get some similar colored high temp paint and see if I can touch it up.