Traction Bars

[Bernd]

Or at least I think that's what they're called. Freind of mine has a drag car and needs these bars tapped to 3/4"-16 left & right hand. Note in the picture that I've got them marked with a felt marker as to which witch is which. Well at least you can see the ones marked with an "R"



Now the ones marked for right hand thread fit in the lathe, barely. If I would of had to drill out the hole I won't have been able to do it. Hole through the lathe isn't big enough. "Oh Honey I need a bigger lathe" NOT. Couldn't tap it anyway. The tap he gave me won't of cut through butter. So I needed to order a new tap, 30 some dollars, ouch.



Now here's the other bar with those plates welded on the side. Not a good fit either. I couldn't even get the tap in.    These needed to be drilled out to 11/16". Guess what, I had to order a drill for..........oh never mind.  It was expensive.



Oh what to do.    I did promise I'd do them. Ah the Buffalo Drill press to the rescue.  



The drill press has a very large hole through the center. I mounted my new 4 jaw and centered it.       

Now all I need to do is wait for the little brown truck to show up tomorrow afternoon as their schedule has promised. 

More pics and stories when I get the tooling. 

Oh BTW this is one of the other job's that' holding up the Shay project. 

Bernd

[dsquire]

Bernd

We must not hold any Hot Roders up. Right! 

Cheers 

Don

[Kjelle]

Bernd, when I read Hot Rod each and every month, they where called "4-link rear suspension", and where considered the most advanced way to tame a rear axle... And we Europeans used it on the Ford Escort Gp4 rally car too...

Good luck with the project, I hope it doesn't take too much time out from the Shay!

Kjelle

[Dave G]

Hi Bernd, I have made four link bars in the same manner as this. You can order tubing with an ID of 11/16" which is the tap drill size for 3/4-16 thread and this makes the job quite simple. I Imagine you already know this but I was warned by a very good chassis builder that making bars this way is only good for about 600 HP. Anything over this will need a larger dia bar. Just trying to relay some useful info to keep everyone safe, Dave

[Bernd]

Ok, That little brown truck showed up this moring at 9:44AM, or at least that's what the tracking info said. Checked outside and sure enough it had showed up and dropped off the prize.



First thing I saw wrong was the drill. No way that was going to fit into a 1/2" drill chuck. Time for a little Madmodd. 
Stick the drill in the lathe. Make sure it runs true and have at it. 



Ok, it's a good fit. 



On to the drill press and some manual labor.  First drill out a small amount of stock. The pipe dosen't seem to be exactly 11/16" ID.



First I did the left hand threads......




then I did the right hand to unwind myself.    (it's hot here in NY, so you'll have to parden the goofieness). 



And ta da, all done.



@ Don - He's a good freind of mine so I drop what I'm doing to help him out.

@ Kjelle - I knew there was another name for those things. Just couldn't remember. Thanks. There's going to be some time taken out as I see some jig's and fixtures that will need to be made in the process of builfin this Shay. I'm just hoping for a nice steady pace.

@ Dave - Thanks for the advice. It looks to me he had shortened the bars. I pretty sure he knows what he's doing since he's a tech inspector at Empire Dragway here in NY.


On to the second project. It's the same as 75PLUS's Thread I'll post a thread on that as I go.

Bernd