When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
Read the Rule book for all potential classes the car might run in. Somethings like tieing to the strut towers or welding to the A pillars are illegal in certain classes. Don't build something that limits you to one organization and one class. Potential SCCA classes I can think of would be Touring 3, STU, STL and ITR. Might be worth a read to brush up on their cage rules.
^ your door bars look amazing! i dont like how that foot box is next to your leg tho, gutting the a-pillar and doing it there seems so much better.
i really like how you even retained the oem door bars!
Agreed on the plinth, it's not bad but I did specifically stress that I didn't want it to protrude in to the foot well.
Originally Posted by miamirice
InsaneSp----That looks great. One thing I like on that is:
nascar bars should meet the vertical tube so that if you were T-boned the horizontal bars would be in compression with the vertical bar it's welded to below the A-pillar (likewise for the rear) When you have an S bend in the horizontal the bar is more likely to shear away from the vertical bar.
I hope that that makes sense. By no means am I a cage builder but I read everything I could find before I had my civic caged
I think the most important area to pay attention to; is the bar left and slightly above, where your head is. Make sure to get the cage very, very tight to the hard top in that area. I'm always concerned with the very small space between the cage padding, and my helmet. This is a simple issue of the hard top angling in toward the seat, and leaving very little room in this area for the cage. In combination with this, get the seat on the floor. This will maximize room, and a safety barrier between your skull and the cage.
I second this - having crashed and hit my helmet against the hardtop and got concussion definitely you want to create as much room here and put plenty of proper rollbar padding in place.
When they did my spec miata cage this bar is one area they realy paid attention to getting the bar as tight to the hardtop as possible.
Something they do in the miata that is realy usefull for getting in and out is a small bar connecting the hoop over the window frame to the top bar, I found a picture bellow to illustrate
I second MrSideways! SCCA allows smaller/thinner tubes if the car is lighter or in a slower class, but you never know what you will end up in. I was going to run ITR, then ended up doing STU. And safer is always better.
I would 'gut' the windshield pillars and run the bar through there. I would also remove the factory dashbar and have the shop make a custom mount for the gages and dash setup, that will save you a good amount of weight (THIS IS NOT LEGAL IN ITR THOUGH!!!).
Also, make sure the cage will be 'PROPERLY MOUNTED TO THE CHASSIS!' You want the mounts to be 'boxed,' not just a bar welded to a flat plate welded to the floor. SCCA also mandates the number of mounting locations depending on the class you are running in, and they dictate the size of the mounting plates, so read-up on that one just to make sure the shop understands that too. Also make sure that you can access everything you need behind the driver's seat area. Sometimes you can get a bar put in that acts as a strut tower bar, but then can't access something underneath it and end up having to drop the rear subframe, which means you have a lot more work and have to do an alignment after that.
Think about how you want the cage mounted to the rear shock tower-area. Honda only spot-welded the inner wheel arches to the main chassis, and if your cage is mounted to the arches (shops like to mount them there), then you might want to have the seam fully welded, or have some bars put in to brace the mounts against the main chassis. the rear shock towers are part of the main chassis, not the wheel arches, and it is deceiving when you look at that part of the car sometimes. Make sure your shop knows how you want it done.
Door bars: YES!!! Imagine having an extra 2 sq. ft. on your left side!!! Do it on both so you can 'gut the doors' on both sides if you want. You won't be able to have windows if you do this though. You can also put the rally-style 'X' instead of door bars which makes it easy to get out as well, and it's a little lighter; it's probably just as safe, they do it in rally cars, but they hit trees, not other (potentially bigger and higher) cars at 100mph, so make that decision for yourself too. Think about how high the front of a new mustang is, and how high your door bars are...you can't make them too high though or you can't get out. If you do this you can gut the doors and lose some weight.
Add a triangulated corner in the top of the windshield on the driver's side with a piece of small diameter metal tubing, just as a hand hold for getting in/out of the car. You'll love that you have it. I don't
You can add gussets in some locations to add strength and rigidity to the cage, but better make sure it's allowed in the rules. If not, I think you can add small diameter tubes to triangulate corners and add strength/rigidity.
Don't put a single diagonal bar across the roof as it causes the car to 'bend funny' (as one Honda engineer put it) under intense braking. So if you first name is Lewis and you drive a pretty quick Mercedes you'll notice, but if your name is Bob and you like to track you S2000 you probably won't notice.
one more important thing: communicate with the shop that does the cage, the actual person who is building it. That person should have a lot of knowledge and be able to help you decide on what to do in certain situations.
P.S. If you're running STU you need a fuel cell. You'll have to mount that with lots of welding of bars and metal shields, maybe they can do that at the same time for you. Learn from my mistake and get one that is at least 15 gallons, so you never worry about starvation.
one more important thing: communicate with the shop that does the cage, the actual person who is building it. That person should have a lot of knowledge and be able to help you decide on what to do in certain situations.
P.S. If you're running STU you need a fuel cell. You'll have to mount that with lots of welding of bars and metal shields, maybe they can do that at the same time for you. Learn from my mistake and get one that is at least 15 gallons, so you never worry about starvation.
Got the cage done and in. thanks everyone for their input and help and especially to Stephen for a place to stay when I dropped it off and a rough template for the cage builder
What seat is that? It looks like it has a significant lateral head restraint.
Is that bolt that presses on the tube to hold the weights adequate? I would have thought the it would have been required to go through the tube. Even then it would be one bolt in shear with a significant amount of weight pushing it off, say in a barrel roll, something the cage and seat would be offering protection from. This is a picture of a popular Spec Miata ballast weight (from East Street). It uses 4 1/2 inch bolts to hold the weight to a base plate which has nuts welded to it.
05-26-2017, 05:46 AM
Nice looking cage! 