Are you going to have your steering midifications examined and approved?
As thats a major modification I would be highly worried about it failing and causing a crash and killing you or even worse someone else.
Yes the steering modifications will be examined and approved. Along with every other modification that would need it. For example the engine conversion. I want this series to be above board and fully legal.
To be honest I'm drilling 2 extra holes which in my opinion won't compromise strength that greatly as it'll only be 2 m12 bolts.
Bolts will be 10.9 tensile strength. Which is what land rover use for this use.
And maximum thread strength is achieved at 1.5x the width of the hole which, if i use m12 will easily be achieved.
And also by machining the original lower pin I'll be bringing the new arm closer to the knuckle thus removing excessive twisting effects caused by the steering.
So effectively what I'm doing is making the swivel/steering set up almost exactly the same as it is on a series swivel.
I've also seen this conversion done on another series that is used on the road and very heavily offroad, ie trialling. And not one breakage.
If it makes you happier i could buy a lhd swivel knuckle and do it the bodged way of fitting the drag link to the track rod.
Or the even more bodged way of putting packing plates in between the spring and axle and using the original track rod.
Believe me I've spent a lot of time mulling over this and it's really not something I'm taking lightly.
Every decision i make has to be right as like you say if it fails the worst could happen.
Just to add.......
If I'm not happy with the work that I'm doing today on the swivels and it doesn't look right/doesn't go quite according to plan i will be binning the idea and going down another route. This is mainly a test (that could work to see what's possible and safe!)
I have another set of unmolested swivel knuckles so can always go back to the drawing board.