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after 6 months, i finally built a rollcage!!!!!!! pix inside


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i got a job 6 months ago at a welding and fabrication shop, if it wasnt for all of you inspiring me to fix my Z myself after the accident.... so far this is the result, its a triumph spitfire vintage series race car, i designed almost all of it myself (boss nudged me in the right directions) let me know what you guys think - pete

 

album_pic.php?pic_id=1444

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Looks nice, neat and strong. Particularly like the two bars forward to the dash area which should improve body rigidity considerably. 8)

 

well its a full scca cage and i believe something connecting main and front hoop is necessary, i wish i had gotten some more pics of it before it was carted away... we noticed something that was peculiar and fairly rare, we went about welding the cage in a different order than we usually do and it actually effected the door gap quite a bit, but we arent too concerned because the old cage that i cut out was basically what we consider today for exhaust tubing.... i cant wait till the next one ! :)

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Whoa! If you are talking about the gap in the front of the drivers door, then that's pretty major IMO. One of my buddies did his own cage twice. He put his car up on jack stands and then welded in the cage. He never made sure his car was sitting straight on the jack stands, he just assumed that his concrete foor was level (it never is, it's always pitched in a garage), big mistake. When he was finished with his cage install, he lowered the car to the ground only to find that the passenger rear was sitting about 3/4" higher than the rest of the car :shock: . It looked goofy, you could really tell that something was not right. Yup, the concrete floor was not flat (gee, go figure :roll: ) If he would of told me what he was doing, then I would have said something (anybody in construction would know this, considering it was also an old cracked floor), but he ended up having to cut up his cage and make a few adjustments. Just a little warning to you folks doing a "do it yourself" cage install, don't trust your floor, make the proper measurements! Remember, your car flexes a bit.

 

!M!

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thats definately a very good point, this cars been raced for years andit was already pretty tweeked, but its not a unibody car so welding a cage to it makes it react pretty funny. my boss has been putting roll cages in for 15 years, ive personally assisted in the construction of ten, also the guy that bought the car just seems to be some guy with money who wants to go racing so he bought a car that looked good. well this car has been repaired at least 10 times in every corner except passenger rear. at least now its safe for a person to be in on the track, cutting apart the old cage was horrifying, missing welds no DOM tube, some of the tube actually looked like what we use to build our porsche exhaust systems, i hope the owner actually races it and this isnt all a pipe dream

 

 

oh i just noticed, so i thought id edit , if your referring to the door gap at the front lower portion, it was like that when we got it. i was talking about the upper rear door gap increaseing like 3/8 of an inch on both sides....

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Hey I forgot to say good job. Yeah, I was refering to the front bottom door gap. Just so you know I was not making fun of your work, I never did a cage install, so I'm not one to judge.

 

Given the chance, I would take a paycut to work in a fabrication shop for a while, just to get some more skills. I would be in heaven with all those awsome tools.

 

!M!

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yeah, as of right now i dont make too much but i dont know anywhere i can get paid to learn the right way, i recently worked on this SCCA rally car and some of the welds on it were HORRIBLE, and they were welded by someone who took a welding course at a tech school... nonetheless i explained to the owner and i will be doing a great deal of work on it once their seasons over. i have people offering me jobs left and right for alot more money and alot more hours (only work 4 hour days) but i wouldnt give it up for the world :)

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On levelling a car before doing structural body work, good point BTW, the last time I did that I jacked the car up and then placed a stand under each front suspension arm near the ball joint and one under the diff. So the car was held up by three stands.

 

Seemed to be the only practical way to level it. Is there a better way?

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some companies (longacre?) sell digital levels they are fantastic for stuff like that. with my Z my only problem is the fact that i dont really have anything left to referance off of that i really trust. as far as being able to adjust how level the car sits, id make a set of plates with those threaded pivoting feet. we use them for alignment stands when we have shops special order them for us. they hold a ton (literally)... practicality has kinda been erased from my thought process, nothing i do is practical anymore. anyone want to trade a CJ7 for my maxima ??? heh

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