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Everything looks great so far man!! Did a nice tight bend job on the plates!
Thanks! I appreciate it. The "hoop" plates are/were a real PITA.
It's hard to make steel curve, and fold/bend straight, with just a steel bench, 2 C-Clamps, and a BFH, LOL.
The others weren't bad at all.
Plan still is to weld it in this weekend. Hopefully, we don't get another snow/ice day at the same time
My son, also a drag racer, got me a sweet Christmas present. A nice RaceQuip Cam Lock harness.
All done, except for paint and interior re-install.
Planned to MIG the floorplates, and TIG the bars.
Ended up having to MIG weld 100% of it due to fitment irregularities. (My fault)
Also had some welding machine (MillerMatic 200) drama throughout the day, which problems for me, when working on MY OWN ****, is 100% expected & NORMAL, lol. Ran out of wire with just the 2 doorbars left. Had to use .023" instead of the .030" we used for the entire job. Didn't have a .023" tip, so weld kinda danced around a little, but by that time, I just wanted to finish and move on.
I can slap together an engine in my laundry room with a mix-match of parts, and dirt and dust all in & over it, and it will be the best engine ever, and then I take a month to make the pre-welded rollbar fitment "look great" and it's still not right...FML...
So, anyway...6 hours total.
Nearly impossible to weld the main hoop where it meets the "rocker panel", since it has to butt against it.
Same with fronts of doorbars. They needed to be right against, sides of floor, to allow enough room to get in and out of the car.
Pivot points are physically as close to each end as possible, also, to allow most room for me to get in and out.
Door panels clear nicely, and I "may" see if I can re-install rear seats, even though they are useless...
Overall, I'm happy with end result, and not much else matters. I'd thought about doing a "cage", but didn't want to get past the point of no return, as far as my car being an honest, streetcar, that I race... and not a "race" car that I drive on the street. I am curious to see what the new weight of it is...My guess is 4125#
So, here's some pre-painted, pre-carpet, pre-interior'd pics...
Note: The harness bar comes straight, and with main hoop physically as far rearward as it can be, didn't allow m y stock seat to recline quite enough to be where it was....I made 2 small bends, near the ends, which allowed me that one extra "click" on the seat recline handle.
The rollbar is the F Body 8 point S&W Race Cars, Mild Steel, 1-3/4" x .134" tubes.
We drove 2 hours away to pick it up. Total cost was $257...
I chose not to use the 2 extra bars, as they'd need me to cutout the rear seat cushion brackets, and I didn't want to do that.
If I ever do one again, which I am NOT, I'd just get the main hoop and floor plates only...and a tube notcher jig
Neither the door bars, or the rear brace bars go to where they designed them to go.
Being I had to cut and bend, or re-bend everything but the main hoop, anyway, it would make more sense to buy straight tubing and cut & bend it to fit.
Also, aside from the door bars, anything that was pre-notched by S&W, fit like ****...
Not trying to badmouth S&W...just stating what I found, on my car, with their pre-notched "kit".
I could have spent TRIPLE the money and probably had better fitment, but it'd more than likely been better fitment with what I have, had I ever done one before, and had a clue WTF I was doing, LOL.
It never goes according to plan! Flat/satin looks good. I use VHT roll bar and chassis spray, seems to work decently. 4,125lbs tho! That's almost two of my cars
It never goes according to plan! Flat/satin looks good. I use VHT roll bar and chassis spray, seems to work decently. 4,125lbs tho! That's almost two of my cars
You got one of those skeleton cars? lol.
I'm probably UNDER, on my weight guess.
It "was" 4,060# with me and 1/2 tank gas.
I'm ditching the back seats, which are fairly light anyway, but the bars got to be putting me over the 4100# mark.
You got one of those skeleton cars? lol.
I'm probably UNDER, on my weight guess.
It "was" 4,060# with me and 1/2 tank gas.
I'm ditching the back seats, which are fairly light anyway, but the bars got to be putting me over the 4100# mark.
Helps when it was only 3000 before I started weight reduction. That's crazy, did GM line them with lead?
It really turned out pretty good being a kit! Plus you tweaked everything to your likings which made it that much better too! Now you don’t have to worry about those track officials busting your ballz as bad now until you crank it up 😝
Cutting carpet, especially on an angle when trying to get it to fit around a bar is almost impossible to get it right. IMHO, more luck than skill…. But I don’t have skill, so maybe the folks that do it for a living know better… lol
I was more nervous for the carpet part, than any other part of the job,
not that it matters now but what I did was fold the carpet up right next the the bar I was going to cut around. I tucked it up very tight to it and then I took a piece of tubing the same size as my cage made a circle right next to the cage bar. Then I cut it out then you can fold the carpet right around the cage and it fits perfect 90% of the time.
not that it matters now but what I did was fold the carpet up right next the the bar I was going to cut around. I tucked it up very tight to it and then I took a piece of tubing the same size as my cage made a circle right next to the cage bar. Then I cut it out then you can fold the carpet right around the cage and it fits perfect 90% of the time.
That damn 10% will get me everytime...lol.
I actually did as you did, with pulling carpetbright up to the bars, but the 2 that I screwed up on are 2 of the 4 that have the bars at a pretty good angle. That made the holes have to be more of a long oval, if that makes sense? I'm going to simply glue a piece of the part I cut out, in to hide it.
01-05-2022, 06:32 AM
nothing wrong with mig. 
