Seam welding

[mranlet]

If you are tremendousally skilled at welding, you may be able to get away without a frame rack, but don't try it unless you're state certified.

If you don't have a frame rack you'll need something just as rigid. Expansion from heat will bend just about anything else that you could normally use. You could concievably build your own frame rack as long as it was square...

What do you have in mind?

-MR

[driftxtreem]

Originally posted by mranlet
If you are tremendousally skilled at welding, you may be able to get away without a frame rack, but don't try it unless you're state certified.

If you don't have a frame rack you'll need something just as rigid. Expansion from heat will bend just about anything else that you could normally use. You could concievably build your own frame rack as long as it was square...

What do you have in mind?

-MR

I am a certified structural welder in three states as well as Japan belive me when I tell you DONT do it. There are some cheep pinchweld clamps that work with jackstands. This will work if the floor is flat and level. If its not you will bend the car to match the floor.

[prodigy]

Yes, my garage floor is level. Do you know where I can get a set of what you stated and what they are called so I can go looking for them?

[driftxtreem]

pinch weld stands look for them were you buy autobody repair tools.

[CrazyHawaiian]

Since my car is unibody I have been seriously considering doing this as well. Currently my car is completely gutted and ready to go. But since I will be installing a cage, I've decided only to seam weld the front portion of the car, mainly the strut towers. The rest of the car will have a cage, so no need to seam weld anything. The strength of the chassis will be tied into the cage. But I can see how this is an advantage if you did the whole car and were able to get away with a smaller lighter cage. Sure takes alot of time!!

[driftxtreem]

Originally posted by CrazyHawaiian
Since my car is unibody I have been seriously considering doing this as well. Currently my car is completely gutted and ready to go. But since I will be installing a cage, I've decided only to seam weld the front portion of the car, mainly the strut towers. The rest of the car will have a cage, so no need to seam weld anything. The strength of the chassis will be tied into the cage. But I can see how this is an advantage if you did the whole car and were able to get away with a smaller lighter cage. Sure takes alot of time!!

What keeps the body from flexing around the cage. How will you install the cage, with just sandwich plates. There is nothing structual to weld it to. I built a 86 camero with a big block and a 671 GMC supercharger, full cage, narrow 9", fourlink, the works and I busted the back glass with all the tork on the body. The car completly flexed around the cage. Hope you have better luck

[prodigy]

Cool thanks, and one more question. On fiberglassing the trunk, do you do the whole thing or just the spare tire and around the wheel wells?

[mranlet]

Originally posted by driftxtreem
What keeps the body from flexing around the cage. How will you install the cage, with just sandwich plates. There is nothing structual to weld it to. I built a 86 camero with a big block and a 671 GMC supercharger, full cage, narrow 9", fourlink, the works and I busted the back glass with all the tork on the body. The car completly flexed around the cage. Hope you have better luck

THat's why you use Polycarbinate

-MR

[mranlet]

Originally posted by CrazyHawaiian
Since my car is unibody I have been seriously considering doing this as well. Currently my car is completely gutted and ready to go. But since I will be installing a cage, I've decided only to seam weld the front portion of the car, mainly the strut towers. The rest of the car will have a cage, so no need to seam weld anything. The strength of the chassis will be tied into the cage. But I can see how this is an advantage if you did the whole car and were able to get away with a smaller lighter cage. Sure takes alot of time!!

You could always one-up the cage and build a spaceframe and then cut out all of the now-redundant paneling. You'd still save weight and you'd be a lot stiffer than a modified Unit-body.

-MR

[driftxtreem]

Originally posted by prodigy
Cool thanks, and one more question. On fiberglassing the trunk, do you do the whole thing or just the spare tire and around the wheel wells?

The whole thing.

[driftxtreem]

Originally posted by mranlet
THat's why you use Polycarbinate

-MR

Street car, wast of money to buy fuel

[CrazyHawaiian]

I dont want to be a thread jacker, but to properly tie a 3rd gen Camaro (82-92) together you need to start at the subframe. Taking the usual subframe connectors a step further, you need to tie these in with the cage. In essense, you begin building the cage under the car, then extend it into the car. From a roadracing / drifting standpoint, once the cage is tied to the subframe (which in turn is tied to all suspension components), it does not matter what the rest of the body does. This leaves the front subframe, which can be tied in from the firewall to the radiator, but even so, considering the front suspension design, the strut towers will need additional support since they support the weight of the car in front. This is why I plan to seam weld the front subframe. The problem here is that all these re-inforcements add weight, which is a real problem when trying to build a drift car. The real tricky part about this will be getting enough strength while not over-do'ing it and adding too much weight. This is a different style of strengthening the car than something you would do for a high torque drag car. The car will produce alot of torque (aiming for 400 ft/lbs at the wheels from 2,500 rpm to 5,500 rpm), but nothing like a big block with a blower. We are more concerned about the car flexing from the forces generated from drifting than flexing from the forces generated by engine torque. My mentor is an old school circle dirt track racer (hobby stock, pro stock). We feel that the theories of building a dirt track chassis also apply to drifting, but just minus the part about making the car so strong (and overweight) that it could handle car collisions. But you know your car is strong when you bang a guardrail and the guardrail breaks instead of the car.

[Chas]

Re: Good sh!t!!

Originally posted by Sideways_In_SD
Hey man Chas has a lot of insight on a lot of things, but please don't assume he knows about this type of material. It's not in his scope of operation.

D-X I'll be waiting for your updates.

first post i havent gotten flamed by you. Yea, Im not to keen on this topic, but ive learned alot from this.

GREAT info. This should be faq'ed

[Sideways_In_SD]

True!

Yeah, that'd be good.

[driftxtreem]

I wanted to point out that seam welding is not required in D1 rules and that there are many D1 pros that donot do this. For instance Kumakubo has not seam welded his car as he likes to feel the course allitle more. What I meen is that if you car is totaly rigid like say a testarosa you donot feel all of the transitions in the course as you would with out the rigid setup. Remember that some body flex ads to traction, it is not only characturistic to the suspension.