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Roll bar question ...


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Hmm , Not saying your wrong but when the roll bar is mounted in the car that flat bar you're saying is for seat support is pretty far away from the seat to support it . Or am I missing something ?

 

 

Don"t believe that is the harness mount. More of a seat support.

Mine has the horizontal bar the same size tubing as the rest of the roll bar.

 

ritrebor

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There are 2 reasons for toolbars, and I accept both as legit: 1) for safety, 2) to look cool. I have had roll are for both reasons, so I'm cool with either.

 

If for safety, they should conform to the rule book you are racing under. If for looks, the builder can do pretty much as he pleases.

 

On my current rollbar, the horizontal bar does two things: seat support and harness attachment, so it is often referred to as a "harness bar." I have a bolt on piece that extends from the harness bar to the back of my seat; this really makes my seatback solid. My rollbar passes tech for NHRA and ECTA. I also built it with features that should make it pass SCCA tech, although I'm too slow at autocross for anybody to really care.

 

That piece on your rollbar is too light to conform to any rule book I'm familiar with. It looks to light to be in compliance as a harness bar, seat brace or head restraint. I think it is just the result of a creative imagination. And I'm cool with that.

Edited by RebekahsZ
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An interesting trend (which makes no sense to me) we are seeing at Z-oriented track days. If the car has no rollbar, the inspectors are allowing stock seatbelts of any age. But, if a rollbar has been installed, they are enforcing racing seatbelt expiration dates and installation standards. Very strange double standard, but be aware. Your rollbar could actually keep you from participating in some track days (???). Crazy stuff.

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Used to have one of these Autopower roll bars. I thought it was supposed to be a harness bar, and I thought it was too small to use as a harness bar, so I added another tube between the backstays at about the same height to attach the harnesses to. If you can't weld, you can pretty easily buy a piece of DOM tubing, use a coping calculator like this one: http://metalgeek.com/static/cope.pcgi

 

Easy to grind the tube with that calculator then you can have a muffler shop weld it in for you.

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lol i thought the HANS hooked up behind you ...to an attachment .... at least thats how it was explained to me when i bought my roll bar...scary to think people selling roll bars dont even know . Hey you can put a Fancy HANS sticker on that bar, thats about it .

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An interesting trend (which makes no sense to me) we are seeing at Z-oriented track days. If the car has no rollbar, the inspectors are allowing stock seatbelts of any age. But, if a rollbar has been installed, they are enforcing racing seatbelt expiration dates and installation standards. Very strange double standard, but be aware. Your rollbar could actually keep you from participating in some track days (???). Crazy stuff.

 

Similarly, there are some organizations that, if a car has a passenger seat, require the passenger harness to be the exact same as the driver harness. So if you have a $500 Schroth on the driver side, a $70 G-Force belt isn't sufficient for the passenger. If you go with the $70 belt on both sides, though, you're just peachy. It makes no sense at all.

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I thought the requirement was for "like" equipment. 5 points on both sides, for example. Or race seats with back supports on both sides, etc.

 

It makes sense in that some people will have a full containment race seat, and use a stock seat with a stock belt on the pass side. An instructor is supposed to get into the car and ride along at much higher risk, because the participant paid $200 to do an HPDE with instruction. It's about safety for driving instructors.

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I thought the requirement was for "like" equipment. 5 points on both sides, for example. Or race seats with back supports on both sides, etc.

 

It makes sense in that some people will have a full containment race seat, and use a stock seat with a stock belt on the pass side. An instructor is supposed to get into the car and ride along at much higher risk, because the participant paid $200 to do an HPDE with instruction. It's about safety for driving instructors.

 

That's very possible, but it wasn't how it was applied in this instance. It could have just been a tech inspector being extra picky or misinterpreting the requirement. I agree that it makes sense to keep the instructor or passenger just as protected as the driver.

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Used to have one of these Autopower roll bars. I thought it was supposed to be a harness bar, and I thought it was too small to use as a harness bar, so I added another tube between the backstays at about the same height to attach the harnesses to. If you can't weld, you can pretty easily buy a piece of DOM tubing, use a coping calculator like this one: http://metalgeek.com/static/cope.pcgi

 

Easy to grind the tube with that calculator then you can have a muffler shop weld it in for you.

 

Jon ,

I'm guessing when you thought it was supposed to be a harness bar you used it as a harness bar for sometime ?

I will have another tube welded for the harness

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Harness bar, period, end of sentence. A left-over from an earlier era. They were sold in two versions, one for street and one for SCCA track use. The street version was just two hoops while the track version had an angled brace and the aforementioned harness bar, which was in reality a loop that could accommodate the seat being installed back into the bend, flat and hoop so one could attach their harness.

 

Neither was a cage but rather just a roll bar, albeit one was stronger than the other.

 

It's threads like this that I miss John even more.

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Harness bar, period, end of sentence. A left-over from an earlier era. They were sold in two versions, one for street and one for SCCA track use. The street version was just two hoops while the track version had an angled brace and the aforementioned harness bar, which was in reality a loop that could accommodate the seat being installed back into the bend, flat and hoop so one could attach their harness.

 

Neither was a cage but rather just a roll bar, albeit one was stronger than the other.

 

It's threads like this that I miss John even more.

Thanks for your input I appreciate it . Edited by VitaminZ
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