?'s about Calmini TRA's

[Drake]

After thrashing my stock TRA's, I was going to put in a set of Calmini TRA's I got off of a salvage vehicle but had a question before I do this. Someone had mentioned that the Calmini TRA's are longer than factory ones and if I don't have the complete Calmini steering system then I won't be able to get a proper alignment. Any truth to this? Is there anyway I can work around it? James and I talked about it and neither of us were certain if it was the actual "barrel" that was longer or if it could be solved by cutting them down a few threads.

If it is true and I can't get a good alignment with them does anybody have a couple of stock TRA's they want to get rid of until I can pick up a set of beefier ones?

[DamnHippie]

It's the barrel that's longer, at least on the ones Martin inherited from Allen. So you couldn't cut down the TRA, but you could conceivably cut down the barrel of the TREs, probably somewhere in the range of 3/8 inch or so. That would still leave plenty of threads engaged, but the cut would have to be very precise 90 degrees, I'd think, the ensure that the jam nut holds tightly.

[Drake]

Thanks man! I'll check it out this weekend and I've got a spare set of TRE's I can give to my machine shop guys and have them do it the right way. I had never even thought about cutting those down.

[DamnHippie]

Cool. That 3/8" number is a guess based on a vague memory. I think I still have Martin's calmini TRAs in the garage, and I've got a new set of AC TRAs sitting on the kitchen table, I'll see if I can get a real measurement of their differing lengths.

[DamnHippie]

Home now... I compared a calmini TRA to an AC, and the calmini is exactly 1 inch longer, all the extra length in the unthreaded center section.

That would mean taking a half inch off each TRE, which wouldn't be so bad, they're threaded a couple inches deep. But I think the calmini TRA would then bottom out, so you'd probably need to cut a half inch off each threaded TRA end too.

[Drake]

Thanks for the info man! I'm going to pull them apart in the morning and take a practice try cutting the TRE's myself since I actually have 4 sets of spare TRE's (counting the ones with the bent TRA's). So if I botch one up where the jam nut won't seat well or trash the threads, then I'll take the Calmini's to work Monday and have it done in our machine shop.

[DamnHippie]

You know, thinking about this some more, I think the first thing I'd try is cutting some of the threads off the calmini TRAs. I tried threading one of the calminis into a stock TRE and it bottomed out before all the threads went in.

Do you have an unbent whole TRE/TRA assembly still? If you could measure that to see what kind of end-to-end length ballpark you need to be in, you could play with the spares you've got and figure out the best way to get there before cutting anything.

Later today we're going to be putting a hoohaa centerlink on Odin's xterra. I'll try to remember to grab the measurements off the whole assembly along the way, in case you don't have an unbent one to work with.

[DamnHippie]

I took some measurements on Andrew's X today. It's 4.40" between the TREs. The calmini TRAs are 4.68" in the center unthreaded section. You need room for the jam nuts too, they're about a half inch wide. That might mean taking as much as 3/4" off the TRE, that's kinda sounding like a lot.

[Drake]

Yeah that is a lot to cut off. But I'm thinking/hoping that some of that extra cutting may not be necessary because on my factory ones there is probably a good 1/2" of threads still exposed on the stock TRA's so that may save me a good bit of trimming at the expense of adjustment length.

I appreciate you taking the time to check all this out for me man. You saved me a lot of leg work and trial and error!

[Drake]

Ok, so I still haven't had the time to "modify" the calmini tie rods to fit my stock setup but now I've located a Calmini CL. My new question is if I get the Calmini CL, will my pitman and idler arm still work with it and will the Calmini CL give me the adjustment needed to fit the Calmini tie-rods so I don't have to cut them?

[DamnHippie]

If I understand things correctly the pitman is the same but the idler is pure calmini-custom. I've never actually seen a calmini steering installed on a vehicle, but I have most of one sitting in my garage. In particular, I have the custom idler that you would need, and I certainly have no use for it if you wanna buy it. I have no idea what shape it's in, and no idea what it's worth, but I can say it'll be cheap, and if the brass bushings in it need replacing it'll be really cheap. It used to be on Allen's Phoenix, he should be able to tell us whether it's in good shape or not.

[Drake]

The guy still has the Calmini idler arm and brace as well. Somebody already bought the pitman arm. The rod-ends of the CL are shot so I'll have to replace those either with my OEM's or buy new. I may make the guy an offer soon and just then take it from there. They look pretty bad but I've got access to a bead-blaster here at work that I can clean them up and repaint them.

Thanks for the info man!