69 Roadrunner steering stops

[AR67GTX]

I've been helping someone assemble a 69 Hemi Roadrunner - an original Hemi but heavily disassembled and sitting for years. Who he bought it from threw in in-correct LCAs when he gathered parts as they lacked the sway bar mounting brackets. He obtained a set of brackets and had them welded on and after installation from what I can tell, they seem to be in the correct place. He's using the stock sway bar. But his tires hit the legs on the sway bar before the turn stops engage. He has 15x8 Rallye wheels on it but we also tried a set of 15 x 7-1/2 with the same results.

This is a car we realized the other day that when he assembled the suspension to the K-member on a cradle with the engine, somehow the UCAs were installed wrong side to side. But, we switched them last week and that didn't affect this issue.

I don't see it as a huge issue considering the manual steering and effort it takes to turn it to full lock anyway but it's bugging him a lot. Anyone ever run into this on a 68 - 70 with stock sway bar. My 67 GTX doesn't have this problem.

Edit: not awake yet - wheel sizes are 15x7 and 15x6-1/2 and not 8 & 7-1/2.

 

[gkent]

I didn't know they have steering stops - I figured it stopped when the wheel wouldn't turn any further.

 

[69hemibeep]

Is he using the stock steering box? What kind of brakes? This is the big one because they came with 15X 6 rims, what back space on the rims?

 

[oldbee]

Had to change lca ‘s yrs ago on my ‘68. Also had to weld the brkts on, never a problem(manual steering also).

 

[gkent]

Those LCA brackets would have little to do with the issue since the front mounts are what position the sway bar.

Is the car off the ground when you're seeing this? If so, check it with the car on the ground. That may be just enough to change the relationship to the curvature of the tire to give clearance. FWIW I used to run G60 x 14's on the front of mine and don't recall ever having issues. Sure, they were a smaller tire BUT they were also much wider.

 

[AR67GTX]

First off - need to correct my goof that I will attribute to not enough coffee yet this morning. The wheels are 15 x 7 Ralley wheels and the ones he also tried he said were a 6-1/2 inch Rallye. I kept quizzing him about this because I thought the biggest wheel Plymouth offered in 69 was the 15 x 6 inch wheel. He finally admitted he just liked the Rallye wheels from the 70 B-body better and the correct repro 15x6 steel wheels were very expensive (he has one for a spare and one other in primer). Not sure how my unawake mind bumped them up an inch.

It's a stock manual box and the sidewall is hitting the leg of the sway bar when on the ground. It is a factory disc brake car with correct brake parts. The 6-1/2" wheels had 215-75/15 tires and was still hitting so tires don't seem to be much issue. The 7" and 6-1/2" wheels do seem to have almost the same backspace so can't expect too much difference. I believe the backspace measured about 4" from memory. I think he said they are the Canadian Rallye wheels(?). He has a stock 15x6 steel wheel and bias ply spare and we test fit it the other day to check UCA clearance but I can't recall if we checked for full steering travel.

The stop is a bump forged into the lower steering link bolted to the spindle and the bump hits a small indent in the flange of the lower control arm. His tires hit the sway bar about 1/8 - 3/16" or so from the stop engaging.