safety cage

Hi guys I'm new here I have a quick question approx. how many feet of tube to properly cage a 96 subaru coupe? to FIA specs of course

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puckhead
Hi guys I'm new here I have a quick question approx. how many feet of tube to properly cage a 96 subaru coupe? to FIA specs of course

Less than 200.

More than 50.

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John Vanlandingham
Sleezattle, WA, USA

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

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2 door? We're doing a cage in a 2 door at the end of August. Easy enough to bend two of everything and easily replicable in the future as well.
Doing a 4 door some other time in August. Likely mid-August.
3 sticks of 20' random 1.75X0.095 and 3 of 1.5X0.095 is about perfect.

Where you at in Littlefun? Mark Malsom and his open class GC rally car live down in that area and he's bored as shit being 20 miles away from the rest of us that live in Denver. Who is doing the cage? Feel free to get in touch if you have any questions or whatever! Our shop is in north Denver so opposite side of metro area but not too hard to get to regardless. We're going to have some WRC BBQ's at the shop with shows projected onto side of building starting probably in August.

I'm by ken carl and wads. I was planning on doing the cage my self I have built a few off-road cages and I had a really good look at a few here on the net they seem easy enough. I think I am going to do a few tweaks so I will have a few questions the cars I've driven I have always had issues with the door bars being to close to my elbows so I was thinking of doing a NASCAR style for the driverside at least what do the sanctioning bodies think of this? I was also thinking of running .120 wall also is this way overkill?

Mark's a Bowles and Wads so super close to you!
I think 0.120 is overkill personally. Just more weight.
Open Light? Sweet if so! Hoping to have 5-10 similar cars by the end of next year in the region and a 3-5 event series. We'll see though.
I personally don't like Nascar door bars. Get the x as low as is legal (see FIA 253 for dimensions) and your elbows will likely be fine.

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puckhead
I'm by ken carl and wads. I was planning on doing the cage my self I have built a few off-road cages and I had a really good look at a few here on the net they seem easy enough. I think I am going to do a few tweaks so I will have a few questions the cars I've driven I have always had issues with the door bars being to close to my elbows so I was thinking of doing a NASCAR style for the driverside at least what do the sanctioning bodies think of this? I was also thinking of running .120 wall also is this way overkill?

Understood on the door bars and elbows. NASCAR door bars won't be to FIA specs. R-A won't accept them for am R-A very likely. OK for NASA, but if you are running RA events, it might be an occasional issue; I have not kept up with what they accept at events as for cages to other sanctioning bodies rules and logbooks.

Sounds like you need to look at the rally cage rules some more.

.120 is pretty heavy but it'll be stout!

Mark B.

I re read the FIA article 253 and it is pretty vague it dosent give a min height for the door bars just a max. "half the height of the door opening" nor does it say they have to exist in the same plane of the rest of the cage or anything like that I guess I will email pat and ask him I also went throught the RA rulebook and I didnt see anything that contradicted the FIA article

yeah, i'm just down the street. i think the car is clean enough to sit in, so if you want to get a feel for it, gimme a shout. my cage is older and doesn't have all the bars that scott's and others have.

would be sweet to have another open light car. i'm thinking about switching back to OL for the competition and lower cost.

sounds good mark I have some material and am pry going to get started on it this weekend. I just finished cutting the glass a friend is coming over to help me pull the roof skin this weekend. what are the common dimple die sizes used? I realy dont want to buy a whole set yet so if I can get by with 1 or 2 that would be great. I still need to make a jig to manufacture gussets but thats no biggie also what gauge are the body tie in plates not the feet of the cage but the ones that have to attach to the main hoop and the a pillars and to the windshield frame?

Do the cage properly, and you should not need tie in plates. Loosing that bit of sight line in a rally car IMHO is critical. My A pillar bars were stitched to the A pillar and I still struggled to see sometimes.

I will give you an example, this is Derik Nelson's M3 build. He did my cage also, and is doing my re-shell cage.



My Merkur was the same way. I watched him spend the first 2 days of the cage build fitting the main hoop and the A-pillar bars.

Ryan at TRF put the A-pillar bars so that they lined up with the line of sight from my seat position. Pretty much doesn't add to the blind spots at all. It looks goofy from other angles and seems they sit too far back when viewed from the side, but they still sit close to the A-pillar.

I never really thought of it, but it was a clever design.

We can help you out with gussets Ken. Have a dimple punch and material. Even have a few gussets left over I think.

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phlat65
Do the cage properly, and you should not need tie in plates. Loosing that bit of sight line in a rally car IMHO is critical. My A pillar bars were stitched to the A pillar and I still struggled to see sometimes.

I will give you an example, this is Derik Nelson's M3 build. He did my cage also, and is doing my re-shell cage.



My Merkur was the same way. I watched him spend the first 2 days of the cage build fitting the main hoop and the A-pillar bars.

How do you fully weld that gusset with the bar welded to the A-Pillar?

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fliz

How do you fully weld that gusset with the bar welded to the A-Pillar?

I need to re read the rules but I am not sure if the gussets need to be fully welded.

I did not do the welding on my cage but at Rally Mexico the head tech said that my cage was the only Mexican or American cage he had seen in the last 8 years that he did not have any issues with the welding. And not all of my gussets are welded all the way around.

All the upper surfaces were welded with the cage legs down on the floor, then the cage is put up on the sill plates. Those gussets are fully welded on the top.