DIY reinforced Steering knuckles

[Mil T]

I know that they are called spindles by Fords part description but they are and have been steering knuckles as long as I've been around.
I have seen some bend by abuse and have read various posts regarding bending by users here on FRF. I decided to build a set of reinforced knuckles with using new parts. I checked on Ebay and found many places to pickup OEM ford f150 front steering knuckles new. Cost was $45 Ea with approx. $20 shipping. I picked up 2 OEM FOMOCO knuckles with shipping for $130. I then purchased Outlaw 4x4's reinforcement brackets for $99 pr. I have a friend with a tig welder and I did a little research on how to weld cast steel and regular steel together. There are many tutorials on the website/YouTube.
I set out to do the welding at my friends house. I brought them home and used Rustoleum truck bed paint. They are ready to put on the truck. I will get to it in a couple of weeks. Here is the finished product ready to install.
not bad for $250 and a little insurance in not doing damage to this part on the truck. Unless I get really stupid which has been know to happen.

 

[BIRDMAN]

Nice work! And actually Ford calls them steering knuckles.

 

[RangerRob]

nice job! I just did mine last week. I went with SDHQs gussets with the double shear option though. All and all a pretty easy mod.

-Rob

 

[CoronaRaptor]

You guys that do these repairs by your self, my hats off to you, wish I had your talents!

 

[Mil T]

Stage II. Installation.

I thought that this would be a straight forward install but had a couple issues that I want to share.
I decided to take advantage of good weather and install these knuckles.

I took the driverside wheel, disc brakes caliper, rotor and dust cover off. I then unbolted the tierod, upper and lower control arms, and disconnected the vacuum line and anti lock sensor. I removed the small nut on the axle at the hub. Everything came apart just fine.
This is where I wish I had done a couple things to the new knuckle prior to just putting it back on.
I decided also to replace the vacuum actuators at the same time. My truck has 60K miles on it and I figured I might as well replace and keep old ones as trail spares.
Here are some pictures of the old vs new actuator splines. You can see on the new one that the gears are only slightly beveled and mostly has a flat surface at the edge of the teeth. The old one the teeth are beveled down from rubbing the hub gear that it lines up with when putting your truck in 4 wheel drive. This is what wears the gear out by rubbing the other gear and beveling the gear. That is the big pop you hear if it has not engaged completely. There isn't much for these gears to mesh and they will try to engage and then slip by the tooth and make the loud pop. The best way to engage 4x4 is to let off the gas and take the pressure off the actuator and hub to let them slip into place.

This is the old gear. You can see I drew a circle around the gear to show the beveling that has taken place.


This is the new gear and you can see how it has a flat surface and the beveling is very minimal.


I hope this helps someone that doesn't understand the concept of how the ford 4x4 works to understand it a little better and for those that hear the pop when they try to engage 4x4 what is causing it.

Now on the knuckles. In my first post of building them, I mentioned that I purchase new ones to do this project. Well the knuckles are Ford OEM but I discovered that the Ford Raptor knuckles have one difference than regular f150's. The caliper bolts for the Raptor are 5/8 " vs 9/16 for the regular f150 so I had to drill the caliper holes out on the new knuckles. Wasn't a big thing but it's a good idea to do it prior to installing on the truck. I also am using RPG front end equipment and in their install instructions it tells you that you have to drill out the knuckle hole for the tie road pins and you must also do that for the upper control arm pin. I did not get the upper control arm hole and the reiforcment gusset that I used from Outlaw Offroad lind up exact so I had to do some drilling to relieve the gusset so I could fit the upper control arm pin. My suggestion for anyone wanting to do this like I did is to drill the hole in the new gusset out to at least a 5/8 or maybe a bit larger before welding it in place on the Knuckle. A lot easier than after you weld it like I did. I was able to drill it with my drill press but it certainly would be an easier task before welding it. Same thing with all the other holes you have to drill out to make all the RPG stuff fit correctly.
Here's pictures of the final install and one of the various holes that need to be drilled.

After installing the passenger side today, I remembered a couple of things I should have written also.
Now this is only if you have RPG Upper Control arms. don't forget the grinding the edge of the knuckle to allow the RPG control arm to be able to accomplish all of it's up down travel without hitting the upper mount surface.



Also no matter what upper control arm, OEM or aftermarket you will have to square the washer that goes between the bottom nut and the upper control arm mount in order for it to sit flat on the bottom of the mount for the threaded pin that mounts the UCA to the Knuckle after you have installed the reinforcement gusset.

 

[skyscraper]

Badass!

I was just wondering about this after reading birdmans knuckle install. We see countless people on here upgrading uca's, lca's, shocks, but what about the knuckle? All those things connect to a cast iron knuckle. If/when I ever get too crazy offroad, I will definitely be doing this. I was a welder for about 4 years. Good write up.

 

[Wilson]

can't a guy get a beefier IWE if we can beef up all this other stuff why not a bevel gear or something?

 

[RangerRob]

can't a guy get a beefier IWE if we can beef up all this other stuff why not a bevel gear or something?

No kidding! When I put my right side back together something with the IWE wasn't quite right so now I have a scraping noise while accelerating. When I let off the gas or shift into 4wd the noise goes away. Now I'm waiting on a new IWE and hoping that will correct the problem.

 

[Wilson]

this is it

 

[Mil T]

No kidding! When I put my right side back together something with the IWE wasn't quite right so now I have a scraping noise while accelerating. When I let off the gas or shift into 4wd the noise goes away. Now I'm waiting on a new IWE and hoping that will correct the problem.

There's a good chance that the plastic vacuum line that makes the iwe work has a crack somewhere in it. Very common repair for Ford f150 4x4. When you get a crack in the tube it does not allow for all the vacuum to pull the diaphragm back to disengage the actuator from the hub and it allows the actuator gear to rub on the hub gear making the noise your hearing. One way to see if that's it is to disconnect the vacuum tube that makes the vacuum at the power brake booster. This will make the gears go to default and engage the actuator and hub gears. You can also put a vacuum pump on the same tube and see if you have a vacuum leak by pumping it up. If there is a leak then it will bleed down if there isn't it will hold the vacuum.
Hope this helps diagnose the problem. No need to buy a IWE if you don't' have to. I replaced all of my small plastic tubing with same size copper all the way between the two IWE's and silicon vacuum hose where the rubber tubing had to be used. I did a write up on it on the forum here. Can't remember where I put it though. http://www.fordraptorforum.com/f170/weak-vacuum-line-grinding-noise-fix-24281/