Let's be blunt. If you're driving a stock-stubbed race car without quick steer you're hurting your chances of consistently driving at the limits without making a lap-time-diminishing mistake.
Saturday Night Buildup driver Bob Carpenter has been competing at Ventura Raceway's 1/4-mile dirt track for almost four years now and he's never used a quick steer. "I can't tell you how many times people have told me I'd be a whole lot better off with a quick steer," Bob said.
With a new car ready to run this season we felt it was the perfect opportunity to see how quick steer compared to standard steering. The result was a resounding success. When using a quick steer, the driver expends far less energy driving the car. Hand movements are reduced dramatically to the point where you will feel like you're giving micro inputs to the steering wheel in comparison to the stock system. You will most definitely need power steering as the effort required to turn the wheel without it is substantially greater.
The real value to quick steer, however, is when you find yourself in trouble. Let's say you over-cooked it into Turn 1 and the rearend swings out waaaaay too wide. With quick steer you can whip the front tires to the right in less than a heartbeat and gather the car back up. If you overdo it with the counter-steering and have to whip the wheel back to the left again, it's a simple flick of the steering wheel away. You will never again find yourself sawing away at the steering wheel and wasting the first 30 feet of the straightaway trying to get straight instead of trying to accelerate.
Of course it will take a night or two of racing to adapt to the new sensation of quick steer. After running a heat race we added a piece of light-colored tape to the top of our steering wheel so Bob could double check himself and ensure that the tires were pointed straight. In the beginning he was moving the steering wheel further than he needed to and this visual aid helped solve that problem.
Installing a quick steer gearbox is actually rather simple and can be retrofitted into your existing steering system. We worked with the crew at D&M Performance Manufacturing in Dumas, Texas, to install one of their quick steers in an '81 Camaro Street Stock. Follow along as we install a D&M unit.
This article originally printed in the August 1997 issue of Circle Track
For more info on Quick Steers and how to select the right one for your application check out Steer Quick with a Quick Steer
