oatmilk Posted October 15, 2006 Share Posted October 15, 2006 To save you the time of reading all the posts, its a Honda Fit being prepped for the Super Street magazine time attack Nov.8th at Buttonwillow or Willow Springs. I forget which. http://www.supraforums.com/forum/showthread.php?t=389525&page=1&pp=25 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
katman Posted October 17, 2006 Share Posted October 17, 2006 More proof that the ability to weld has nothing to do with the ability to design safe, light, cages..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnc Posted October 17, 2006 Share Posted October 17, 2006 Its like someone looked at pictures of roll cages in various tuner magazines and then picked the stuff they thought looked cool. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
240hoke Posted October 17, 2006 Share Posted October 17, 2006 So could you guys tell us what is so bad about the cage? That way people like me that dont know alot of rollcage fabrication can learn from it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tube80z Posted October 17, 2006 Share Posted October 17, 2006 We can start with the basics. The car is a FWD chassis. The cage looks to be built for a RWD car and doesn't hook to the front at all. How the legs of the cage hook into the chassis don't seem to make sense. The fabrication is top notch. I wish I could weld that good. Cary Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted October 17, 2006 Share Posted October 17, 2006 They have an awful lot of support going to what looks to be a rear SHOCK tower, not a rear strut tower. I just checked and I found that the Fit has a beam axle in back, so bracing that shock tower isn't exactly the highest priority. I don't know where the springs hit the chassis or if there are any control link points that might be reinforced, but it doesn't look like there is any reinforcement there. What I thought was redundant was the A pillar bars. They have the bar that goes forward to the dash which I think is bent too much , then another bar right behind it that follows the pillar itself. I think the X from the main hoop to the rear shock tower is heavier than a diagonal in the main hoop itself, and the X from the shock towers to the back makes it look like the guy is planning on taking a pretty serious hit to the rear. The gussets from the a pillar to the roll cage and roof I like, although the diagonal gussets between the A pillar bar and the roof bar seem excessively long, same with the ones from the main hoop to the bar above the windows. And as Cary said, nothing going out to the front suspension points or drivetrain mounting points which I would think are the most important ones in this car. Funny, because I just glanced at it at first and thought "Nice!" then I saw the other critical posts and started to realize, maybe it wasn't so great after all... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted October 17, 2006 Share Posted October 17, 2006 If you go all the way to the end of the thread, they do reinforce the spring mounts and install a weight jack in the back as well. They also have some improved front suspension pieces. Still could have tied the main cage to the strut towers through the firewall, but it's actually a lot better than just the first set of pictures. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnc Posted October 17, 2006 Share Posted October 17, 2006 Granted, I didn't go to the myspace site and review the entire cage... But the plating on the rear shock tower appears to not be welded on the top. That would mean the cross bar and the bottom legs of the "X" brace are welded to a hinge, not a plate. The side hoops appear to bend more then 90 degrees and even appear to bend back on themselves. That tends to make them more like springs and less like braces. The rear "X" brace meets earlier FIA rules but those rules have since been updated and now the FIA requires a diagonal brace in the main hoop, which is missing from the pictures I saw. SCCA has always required the main hoop diagonal. The boxes that main hoop sits on seem small to me. I would like to see more tying in to the rocker panel and floor or maybe the main hoop needs to rest on top of the rocker panel with extra plating to tie that section together. And looking at the the straight vertical tubes that cut across the front of the side hoops, it looks like they are not one continuous piece, but have been welded together top and bottom. Bracing is generally supposed to be one piece. The side hoop gusseting looks fine to me, although its probably a bit much for as light as that car would be. SCCA now required NASCAR style driver's door bars so, as the vehicle owner, I would be grumpy about paying for an X driver's door bar knowing that in 2007 it won't be legal for SCCA and NASA events. EDIT: With the amount of tubing used and the inherent strength required of all new car chassis I'm sure that car will be very safe to drive. Its not as bad as I first posted but I think a lot of weight was added that could have been avoided. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
katman Posted October 18, 2006 Share Posted October 18, 2006 I lot of weight up very high, I might add. It's already a fairly upright car, and they pretty much put everything they could up high- Petty bar, X brace to the rear, crossbars up front etc. I would have built it as if it was a roadster with only the main hoop above the driver's head..... Yeah, it'll be safe- especially if they put the stock side air bag "curtains" back in! In stock form it's pretty impressive for a $15k car. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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