Houge and Andy's Early items

[Ruffy]

Here are some early Prototype Houge trailing arm car items I just found mixed in a box with stuff I had from my desk drawer from the time when I worked at Composite Craft. These things haven't seen the light of day since 1990 I believe. These are front Houge aluminum arms, rear white molded prototype arms that look like the final molds, aluminum center steering bellcrank and a prototype molded rack and pinion steering bellcrank that is smooth as silk and works very well still.


Now if I can just find those Houge arm mounts I can maybe have a chassis somewhere nd put another vintage car together.

[m_vice]

Very cool Ruffy. love the arms

[LTO_Dave]

Did the aluminum arms and steering ever make it into production?

[Ruffy]

Not that I remember, the aluminum arms were used in a very narrow "skinny" front chassis for testing purposes only, and only a few Team Drivers had them. These aluminum arms are slightly longer (~1/8") than the RC10 CE or '93 Worlds car front arms, giving 1/4" wider overall if put on a standard chassis, but with the skinny front chassis Houge was designing, the width would be ROAR legal, but much like the direction of the now B4 (skinny chassis, extra long arms).
By the way, these arms are slightly shorter than the B3 arms, so the B3's chassis is even narrower than the Houge prototype.

[scr8p]

ruffy, the aluminum center point bellcrank. is that something that made it into production? i have one that looks just like it, but i've never seen another one until you posted that one.

[Eau Rouge]

ruffy, the aluminum center point bellcrank. is that something that made it into production? i have one that looks just like it, but i've never seen another one until you posted that one.

Houge Illusion drag cars (Top Fuel dragster, Pro Stock, etc...). Terrible bump steer for anything else because the steering links were way too long.

[scr8p]

here's a pic of the one i have. it's a little different though. wider at the ball studs, extra hole on the servo arm......

[Eau Rouge]

Houge parts were all injected molded composites. I don't think that's a Houge part, but that's just a guess.

[scr8p]

i really have no idea who made this. i got it years ago from a fellow racer, and tried it on my D.O. team car for a short time back then. that's why there a hole in the chassis that shouldn't be there.

[Eau Rouge]

Perfect on a narrow front end drag car where you are worried more about space and weight than steering geometry. Probably not so well for much of anything else.

[Ruffy]

The initial Houge items were all aluminum machined items, not for sale as Eau Rouge indicated correctly. Only prototype stuff for testing was used by some team pilots, but these items were then returned for further R&D and eventually the final designs made it into the molded products. The intial run of molded products were injected from virgin nylon (like the white parts I have) but these were not for sale either, finally then the production items were molded in black for sale.

Not sure what bellcrank that is scr8p, it has been many years since I worked as an R&D engineer specialist for Composite Craft (we made most everything Houge designed), but as he indicated most of the single bellcrank systems were for drag racing to reduce weight.

[Eau Rouge]

A design still ahead of it's time...

[scr8p]

well, it's just one more of those parts that'll sit in one of my drawers until the end of time.

[JHarris]

Hey Ruffy,

Those trailing arms would look great on my Houge car! Speaking of Houge, you gonna put up a picture of those other parts that we have? I will be putting those "other" parts to use on the build I'm starting now. Can't wait to see them installed.

Gary Fulp runs that single steering bellcrank. I will try to remember to ask him next weekend if her remembers who produced it.

[SteveK]

That rack and pinion steering unit was produced by somebody, I forget who. I remember the RCCA ads, and it was used in a Team Car build with the Andy's trailing arm chassis. The gear had a splined shaft so you could put the servo saver on there, no more hole in the chassis to clear the servo.