stiffening the ol' fox body

luckythirteen13 · 11-01-2006, 08:50 PM

this is where im at after about 2 days. neither day was more than a few hours tho. still have the halo and all the front of the cage stuff to do and the door bars. and i plan to tie my upper torque boxes into the cage so i have a lot of work a head. i have to leave for work soon so ill find out if just the roll bar alone made the body feel any stiffer

ddeaton66 · 11-01-2006, 10:11 PM

Get those torque boxes tied to eachother and the cage and you'll be able to tell a big difference if you have the HP to make a difference.

89GTRed · 11-02-2006, 02:29 AM

wow, nice. thats pretty cool you are doing all that yourself. Never welded b4 so i dont know much about it but it sure would be a nice skill to have. lookin good so far bro.

luckythirteen13 · 11-02-2006, 02:56 AM

Quote:

ORIGINAL: 89GTRed

wow, nice. thats pretty cool you are doing all that yourself. Never welded b4 so i dont know much about it but it sure would be a nice skill to have. lookin good so far bro.

thanks! the welding is easy, its all the bending thats tough.....not physically but to hit all the right degrees. the main hoop was the hardest because it has 4 bends in it.

89GTRed · 11-02-2006, 03:35 AM

well all i have to say is thats some badass skills to have man. Youll have to post more pics when you get time and its all done, i wanna see mor of your work .

luckythirteen13 · 11-02-2006, 08:44 PM

i got more work done today after school. it doesnt look like much for about 3 hours work but making all the seems fit right it very time consuming.

this is just a view from behind

here is what holds my 5 point harness shoulder straps in place. im not done with this. i plan to get some flat steel and make a rectangle "loop" that sits on the horizontal cross bar that holds the two straps closer together so they cant slip off the shoulder.

and this is why i put that 90* bend in the back of the rear tubes. so i could tie the rear shock mount directly into the cage. having two points so close to the rear shock will hopefuly insure that the body in that area wont flex at all which will press the tires harder into the track when weight transfers

none of the seems are fully welded. most are half way around and then i stopped. welding is easy so im leaving it for the end till all the fabricating is done

Ryan5.0 · 11-02-2006, 08:49 PM

Thats too cool. Keep showing updates please. Looks fantastic. Now I want one-although I don't need one-yet.

ddeaton66 · 11-02-2006, 08:50 PM

Looking awesome man! What are you using to bend with and do you have any pointers on the bending procedure? Maybe you could give pics through the process of a bend. What's the spec on your tubing?

Great job

ddeaton66 · 11-02-2006, 08:52 PM

One more thing, what welder are you using?

TIA

luckythirteen13 · 11-02-2006, 09:16 PM

here is a few pics of the tube bender i have. its all physical work. no fancy hydrolics like you see on tv.

my welder is a hobart. 130armps i believe. on the highest setting i can see the penetration on the other side of 1/8" steel.

for pointers, i would say take your time, messure multiple times before you bend. and keep track of what your doing. if you let the pipe twist at all after the first bend, when you slide the pipe further in for the second bend in another place, the bend wont be flat like the first one. so when making the main hoop with 4 bends in it, its real easy to loose track of the pipes desire to twist in the bender and when your all done, the main hoop wont lay flat on the ground. also, each bender is different. they all start the bend in different spots from where you make your mark. for example, if i want a bend to start after i have 8" of straight pipe, i need to lay the pipe in the bender with only 7" of pipe sticking out because my bender starts the bend 1" late. the instructions that came with my bender said that each bender is different and that starting the bend .5"-1.5" was normal. its no big deal, just one more thing to take into consideration

the tubes are 1.75" OD with .134 wall. nhra standard