Introduction / 4 seater cage question

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alkun
No one is going to harsh your mellow and tell you that your platform is crap.

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john vanlandingham
What pleasure to you get in "encouraging" people to put effort into obviously pointless dead end chassis?

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NoCoast
It's a mildly better choice that a Kia Sorento.
I had friends with those in high school. Fun little shitbox, I'd never consider it for a rally car or roll cage.

I guess no one actually used the word crap, shitbox is close though. I don't take offense, just wondering if there is legitimate sentiment behind the trash talk as they both have said they have direct experience with this chassis.

From lurking and reading on here these 2 guys seem to contribute allot of helpful and knowledgeable info so i was looking for some kinda actual substance. Not trying to provoke anything or seem resentful, I'm clearly the new kid and that's cool.

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alkun
But, if you are thinking about maybe rallying it, you had better buy at least two more of them so you will have spare tail light lenses, fenders, windshields, etc.

Ya totally valid, one of the good things about the windows is they are mostly pretty flat so I think I can make most of them from lexan easily enough. I mean I love the car but honestly it's not gonna win beauty contests. As long as I can patch something back together for lights and whatnot that function correctly I don't really much care if they aren't the exact stock pieces. As for the functional mechanical bits I'll put up some pictures and all explaining my plan for the car a little better. I'm trying to source out and integrate parts I can service more readily that have a stronger aftermarket/ junkyard support.

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alkun
And I'm not a tech inspector, but I'm pretty sure the double roll hoop design will not pass. If you look at 4-door cages, the main hoop is usually half way back into the rear door opening, (not at the B-pilar) so that there is enough room in front.

Ya your the first to say it point blank but I suppose that should have been obvious to me before. No biggie, the back seats were really only suited for small children anyhow.

Bottom to top are stock vista intermediate shaft and driver side cv axle, awd dsm, 3000 gt.



It's hard to tell from the pics but the 3000gt axles are huge. They are engaged into a gst wavetrac. This diff uses the bigger axles from the later year front wheel drive turbo dsms (gst) and the awd dsm cvs will not fit, The gst only had unequal length half shafts with no intermediate as well, I found the non turbo front wheel drive 3000 gts have the big equal length half shafts though. They are still pretty plentiful and no one really breaks these even in those 3800 lb cars.



That is my front ring gear from the colts km182 on the gst wavetrac. I have it all back together and test fit the axles and everything works. Lots of factory part number cross referencing and junkyard experimentation went into figuring that all out.

There are several other important revisions I am making to the front end to go along with these axles and front diff though, I got a hold of an entire twin turbo stealth minus engine and trans. I am using the spindles and hubs, front brakes and brake master cylinder from this car on the colt. I am widening the track by 4 inches to accommodate the axle lengths and to be able to clear wider rims with a good turn radius. I've already got some beastly DOM tubing and quality rose/heim joints to fabricate the new longer lower control arms and radius rods with. i am also making a tubular front cross member using forward ladder bar brackets for the radius rod attachment point to play with tuning prolift in the front suspension. Integrating a solid front roll stop into that crossmember. All of my daily drivers for last few years have been solid mounted and I only have good things to say about that.

You seem like you have few brain cells to rub together and you can write complete sentences. I appreciate that. Unlike the moron asking about the Mustang, you might at least consider what we have to say.

If you have any intention to compete with the car go ahead and read through the Rally America and NASA rules. There are also some good cage diagrams to look at. As far as the safety rules go there is very little room for argument or interpretation. You just need to toe the line on safety.

I can't say if the car will be well suited to rallying but I do know that it will be hard to keep up with the demand for spare parts on an oddball vehicle. Add to that having to learn everything the hard way and the whole endeavor becomes really difficult.

If I were you I would keep this car as daily driver with a nice roll bar. Without having to conform to a rule set and less than half the structure of a full cage you can keep the bars away from your head. A small fender bender will smack your head against a cage. SFI padding is hard as a rock!

If you want to actually compete start thinking about a platform where you are not reinventing the wheel with everything.

Please don't drive like an asshole on the open road and injure someone! Satisfy your need for speed at the track or on a closed rally stage.

Keep listening and asking good questions!

---

Robert.

"You are way too normal to be on Rally Anarchy." Eddie Fiorelli.

tt stealth



4 piston fixed calipers, I've got a full rebuild kit and ss lines for them too



3000 gt booster vs dsm



Bigger booster and larger bore master cylinder mounted up just barely fits, don't mind the rust I've not cleaned up yet. The stock brake fluid reservoir was remote mounted on the strut tower there, hence the nice job it did on the paint. I think the integral 3s master is much cleaner than the colt or dsm remote setup actually.



New hubs, extended studs



Mounted with the 17" rims I had available



Then with my friends 10.5" cobra Rs. Obviously I will need to cut the shit out of the fenders and put new flares over them but I'm ok with it. Not actually using these rims or tires I just wanted to test fit them.

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Rallymech
If you have any intention to compete with the car go ahead and read through the Rally America and NASA rules. There are also some good cage diagrams to look at. As far as the safety rules go there is very little room for argument or interpretation. You just need to toe the line on safety.

I will look those up and read them. I am seeing more now there is a very specific form to follow on the cage. Thats ok though, I really need to sit in a real fia cage and see what the hell I am thinking about getting myself into here. Like I said I'm not doing the cage immediately but I want to do it correctly. I'm laying out like a kinda build thread here now and you guys can judge if you think it will be serious enough to eventually need a proper cage. I will read everything I can and participate in rally cross events and learn more about what a real fia setup is all about first.

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Rallymech
I can't say if the car will be well suited to rallying but I do know that it will be hard to keep up with the demand for spare parts on an oddball vehicle. Add to that having to learn everything the hard way and the whole endeavor becomes really difficult.

As you will see I am adapting many parts from other cars that will be more serviceable. The wheel hubs and rotors for example for the 3000 gt I can get at any big parts store. They still stock the rebuild kits for the calipers from mitsubishi ect.

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Rallymech
If I were you I would keep this car as daily driver with a nice roll bar. Without having to conform to a rule set and less than half the structure of a full cage you can keep the bars away from your head. A small fender bender will smack your head against a cage. SFI padding is hard as a rock!

Like I said I will definitely do this first and progress from there. I don't want to build something I will need to cut up down the road though either. I know about welding in tight spots and if I already have a bar welded in adding a full cage to it later will be impossible to fully weld without completely cutting the roll bar back out. Which part of the cage would you hit? My head is not near the roof and the main hoop will be behind the seat. I don't think the reinforcement bar right near your head between the main hoop and forward a pillar bar is even required is it?

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Rallymech
If you want to actually compete start thinking about a platform where you are not reinventing the wheel with everything.

I really think I can build on allot of the dsm and evo knowledge for this, I am using many of the same parts. All the specific pieces of what I'm doing coming together as they are is unique but all the different parts have been done and proven for the most part before.

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Rallymech
Please don't drive like an asshole on the open road and injure someone! Satisfy your need for speed at the track or on a closed rally stage.

Keep listening and asking good questions!

I really wish I hadn't come off like that, I honestly am a very responsible driver. My other interest in the fia cage is because it has much more carry over to other motorsports, rally is simply the most demanding as far as safety and cages goes so I figured I would start here and learn from the best. Pardon my learning curve and please have patience with my questions.

The wavetrac is really interesting, for those who might have never heard of it, it's a modified torsen





There is a cam almost akin in a way to the ramps in a salisbury clutch lsd that loads the gearset to add supplemental torque bias.



They don't advertise it much but they actually sell uprated spring sets and different friction discs to augment the preload. I ordered and installed the stronger stuff. The plain steel disc is suppose to provide more friction than the standard carbon one but it also wears more quickly and requires periodic servicing depending on how much you beat on it. The carbon ones are virtually wear proof.

AAAAnd on to the IMPORTANT differential. The rear.



This is the evo rs salisbury clutch rear lsd. It fits the dsm differential with the evo inner axle cups. Mitsubishi also intentionally stacked the friction discs incorrectly for the us market because they think americans are sissys who don't like ratcheting sounds and power on oversteer. So you gotta rip her open and restack it like this.

This is the evo lsd carrier next to the stock open colt rear



and next to the stock dsm vsicous rear lsd



Ring gear mounted up



Ready for fun

Here are the stock colt axles next to the stealth



I had the stealth axles cut and resplined (still within the case hardened skin of the axle) to fit the tripod bearing to fit the evo inner cups to mate to the evo lsd. The stealth outer axle cups kindly spline directly onto the colt outer stubs. That part is the same for the awd colt, dsm and 3000 gt/stealths.

I don't think I should be breaking axles very easily. One of my main gripes about high power imports in general and even if the cut axles do fail at least I have a prototype to have custom 300m axles copied from that I know fit and work before I invest that $ in an experiment.

Most of these parts are just interesting things I've collected over time without a specific goal until now. One of the other trick parts of this front end operation is the super quick ratio evo 8 steering rack. I also finished a shaft linkage with 2 solid u joints from a dsm eliminating the stock rubber mush joint and adjusting for the slightly taller input shaft on the evo vs stock colt. Still need a nice way to seal it back up if anyone has a good suggestion for what might work at the firewall.



I have solid mounted the evo rack to the subframe with 3/4" bolts, another simple addition like the solid engine mounts I have nothing but good things to say about from doing the same on my previous cars. The steering geometry was so different between the colt spindles and the evo that the measured steering ratio was closer to 8:1 than the evo's 13:1. I am not using the stock colt spindles though, the stealth hub's steering arm is much closer to the evo's. I will still need to work out and correct for bumpsteer after I have fabricated the new control arms.



Another nice bonus was the 6 bolt 4g63 clutch setup in the colt while visually very different than a dsm maintains all the same important dimensions.



Crank flange to friction disc height and starter engagement depth,diameter and tooth count are identical. Which means I can use my cromoly act flywheel and 2600 pressure plate and ceramic 6 puck from my old dsm.

I also modified the strut towers to fit galant struts, mainly just drilling new holes and beating the shit out of the sheetmetal until everything cleared.





I won't get into exactly what these struts are just yet as that is a discussion all unto itself. Here are some pics of the mystery car though for those who don't think the vista is rare enough. The important point about this though is that I have it all mounted up on the colt chassis with the stealth hubs and evo rack. So I can use any other dsm spring or entire strut assembly now. i realize the opening for the strut hat is too small but I can cut that out and weld the correct size in later, I mainly wanted to see if these larger struts could physically fit in the colt sheetmetal first.

Here is the mystery galant



and here are it's wonders





I had the entire system working before I removed it from the galant too, it's much more resoponsive than I expected and it impressed the hell out of me. Even if I never get it working the range of manual adjustment on ecs shocks is enormous. Those 3000 gt wise out there, ya the electronic dampers are very similar but there is a WHOLE lot more to the system on this galant. Also the stealth had eibach pro kit springs on it, in the one picture with the cobra rim I do have the stealth eiback mounted on the galant ecs strut. It doesn't quite fit right but it's supposedly progressive from 225 in lbs to 450 ish. I just want to see where the colt would sit with those springs. I have not put the engine back in yet too see but I might try these springs out, the ecs dampers should be strong enough for them. They will not be lowering springs obviously in a car more than 1000 lbs lighter than the stealth.

Here are some t case comparos, colt vs dsm





Look at the number of bolts, flange and bracing differences. The long stretch of the dsm output shaft is usually what breaks too, the colt's is short and sweet. Also notice the dog teeth on the input shaft



Its locked out in my transmission with the Viscous coupler serving full time awd duty but it was definitely made to have a manual 4x4 shifter. If anyone knows what the hell else had this I would love to learn more about it.

If anyone can figure out what the shift rail on the right side of this next picture is and how it functions in this transmission I will be really impressed. Tripped me out when I finally figured it all out.

Finally I've got some 4g63 power teasers for ya

Imagine how nice this car would go with the work you're putting into a Mini/micro van..

Galant we know from its record is a fine car...

We also know that nobody else in the world at any level thinks a micro van or mini van is the hot ticket for going fast in the woods..

How did everybody else go so far wrong?

---

John Vanlandingham
Sleezattle, WA, USA

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

www.rallyrace.net/jvab
CALL +1 206 431-9696
Remember! Pacific Standard Time
is 3 hours behind Eastern Standard Time.

No you are totally correct, I'm not saying I don't love my colt, but I would have built that gsr. It did not have a proper title and had been a parts car for years, I got it at the very end because the suspension scared everyone else. I will put up some pictures of my fiends vr4, he put the engine from his 9 sec talon into it, hes been restoring it for about a year or so now.

The colt is lighter, I can haul like 3 transmissions in the back, even behind the rear shock mounts where a cage would terminate. It's just overall more useful and appealing to me. I'm not trying to make the super best rally car in the world here man, I just want to rally MY car you know? It will be a fast drag car. It's ok if it's not the fastest rally car. Even a slow rally car is probably more fun than very fast drag car, would you agree to that much at least?

Also I'm not sure I still understand why the galant would be any better anyways? I'm not saying I am disagreeing with you, I just suspect I am missing something here. Awd dsm, galant and colt are all very similar suspension and drivetrain wise so what is the real difference for a rally car? Is the galant better than a dsm? What about a 3000gt?

Rigidity. That's the answer huh? The very same reasons I'm using to justify the need for a cage are the same reasons you wouldn't start with this form in the first place?