Stitch welding 1991 Honda crx before or after cage?

Hey guys I'm at the mid point of my build and it's stitch welding and cage time.
Any suggestions in regards to order of operations?
I need some experienced hands on Honda rally cars cause rice advice don't cut it.
Here's what I knows bout Hondas n ralllyin.

Re Inforce front strut towers cause they're prone to pounding out.
Reinforce your lower control arm connections in chassis because they tend to stretch or tear under jumping pressures.

This is going to be production class in cars, stitch Weldin is allowed. I'm trying to keep costs down without going backwards.
My brain (auto mechanic) says stitch it then cage it. Where do these fuckers NEED it or is doing the whole chassis best for longevity?

I'm familiar with crumple zone arguments ect. Would appreciate any advice or experience In Regards to Honda Ef chassis.

If there's anything missing or questions in general ou of curiosity ill gladly field em!
Cheers fellas

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All bridges burnt, island life is beauty

Depending on the level of stictch welding you are doing, it is a lot easier to stitch with out a cage in the way. Make sure the car is level, best on jack stands before starting. I saw a car caged while it had a flat tire and the damned thing was visably torqued when done and on all good tires.

The Honda shell is made out of the foil inside cigarette packs...the Japaneses sens 10s of thousands of cute girls over supposedly to go to University here at UW, but in reality each night they don the skin tight black Ninja catsuits and scour the streets picking up every cigarette pack and with the origami skills they have honed in Zen meditation since childhood, carefully fold and bend the foil into Honda body --and suspension---parts...

Seriously. Look around. When was the last time you saw an empty cigarette pack?

As such the shells are flimsier than the average flimsy modern shell--and they're all flimsy and the welder in me has seen to my shock how welding warps things..
Thus GOOD thought out cage installed first....attach that in 15-25 places (and you don't need to be stupid with the tabs you attach it with, the car stamping is between 0,75mm to max 0,1mm it is pointless to use more than 1.5mm aka 16g)
Then stitch weld whatever is easy and whatever is stressed.

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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.

I know the ford books advocated putting the cage in first to help the chassis keep its shape / prevent warping from stitch welding.

in my mind it seems like it would be easier to stitch without the cage in place, and take your time to not warp anything - since you're going to have to do that in plenty of places regardless.

I'll be stitching my car with the cage in - because the car was finished and logbooked 7 years ago...

"strut" tower tops are probably less important than the upper control arm mount area - seeing as it's not a strut some loads won't affect the towers at all, and others will be shared between the shock mount and the UCA.

Rear LCA tear-outs have been mostly on the later (92+) chassis, and IMO in a large part because of running huge sway bars (that connect in the middle of the LCA, so 50% motion ratio "necessitates" an even bigger bar). Still can't hurt to reinforce anywhere the suspension connects.

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KF7RWG
http://www.utahrallygroup.com



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/12/2013 08:44PM by Aaron Luptak.

Thanks for the input guys, ill admit welding this old chassis spooks me a little, don't wanna burn through cause everything I can weld with is mig for shop fabrication (benches, welding valves under seats to knock em out in oil pipeline cylinder heads)
Luckily and the reason I got this chassis is it is rust free easy to work on and have three drivetrains for. I've read johns write ups on .30 wire the 1 inch to every 1.5 rule, and starting in opposite corners and working towards the middle to avoid overheating the metal panel as a whole. I'm curious to see the nitrogen beam of death in action to wrap my head around getting seam sealant out. Wire wheel sounds most commonly sucessful couples with map gas to melt it first as far as immediate gratification is concerned.
I read soda blasting can get the glue out but is a bitch to wash out. A friend owns a powder coating biz and says he's willing to let me blast the chassis there for the cost of product if I need. It seems if I went this route I could stitch it up in a small window, reassemble Johnny 5 and start cage work.

Any gripes with soda blasting before welding??

Thanks again for the response barrage it's reassuring there's some troops out there.

Btw ill post pics I just don't wanna be the guy that stripped out his interior cause no one has seen that before.
Dry ice made short work of the sound deadening ill tell you first hand.
Love that YouTube stuff sometimes

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All bridges burnt, island life is beauty



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/13/2013 01:59AM by Snidewhips.

Iam no fabricator nor am i an engineer, i would consider stitch welding with the car on the ground with the doors shut tires on the ground. my reasoning is some car will bend a bit on jack stands to the point where the doors are tough to open. why not stitch it in its happy place. also worth mentioning i have heard it was not uncommon to braze the seams with coat hanger, but that was back in teh day when rallyists were men and the women...

Quote
BJosephD
Iam no fabricator nor am i an engineer, i would consider stitch welding with the car on the ground with the doors shut tires on the ground. my reasoning is some car will bend a bit on jack stands to the point where the doors are tough to open. why not stitch it in its happy place. also worth mentioning i have heard it was not uncommon to braze the seams with coat hanger, but that was back in teh day when rallyists were men and the women...

The brazing reccomendation was from a unique deal in England the therre was a monopoly on oxygen...and we all know what happens when filthy capitalists via bribes and/or corruption get a monopoly: everybody gets fucked.
So there was brazing ....with carbon arc . Most amazing thing I've seen, fawkin dramatic.
Additionally smaller MIG was not common out of the Nordic countries in the early 70s, usually bigger BIG! machines, way expensive,.
The first machine I ever saw like the current (last 25 years) Hobart Handlers or Miller 110 things was in Bilsport Magazine, the Swedish magazine in about 1984 featuring a ESAB machine which the lead guy--who I telephoned who said "This is really aimed at the guys restoring a classic car, or like rally car owners" I asked of course since he mentioned rally and he was into restoring classics...

So nobody who had any other option would resort to braze unless forced to..too much heat, too long in a area.


* I was a welder in Sweden mainly during late '75 and thru early 77 and some sporadically after, mainly MIG. Sand truck bodies among other things. You want to see warp? 5-6-7" of warping from welding too long in one area?
Ta! DA!!! I did it...pooor me...

---

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 BRAZING !

Don't worry about welding the chassis with normal procedures, it is fine. You won't have any huge burn thru or warping issues if you know how to weld. I've never had a problem with caging or welding on Asian cars. Scape the sealer, wire brush, pass a torch over the area , brush again and weld away. I do wear ear plugs and like to have a fan on to draw the fumes out of the car. I've done at least 100 cages over the last 40 years with this procedure and no issues.

Clean the seams, cage it, then seam weld.

Never understood the issue with a cage being in the way of seam welding.....shock towers, inner fenders, firewall, floors...etc are all easy to get to with a cage installed.

Sweet info I'm gonna kicks the interior and engine bay in the ass this weekend. After that will be the under carriage, tackling the black asphalt hard under coat will be the challenge there.
Again, any easy tricks would be appreciated
I've been trying to research where the seams are so I can solely strip and weld em but if the asphalt stuff doesn't come off I may exercise the blaster on the underside.

Side note, just found my rods out of round and more than 2 thou taper on all cylinders except one so sleeves and honing some rods is in order.
Thank good nass I work in an engine machining shop eh?
Cheers boys
God speed with the fab n racin

---

All bridges burnt, island life is beauty

Quote
Snidewhips
Sweet info I'm gonna kicks the interior and engine bay in the ass this weekend. After that will be the under carriage, tackling the black asphalt hard under coat will be the challenge there.
Again, any easy tricks would be appreciated
I've been trying to research where the seams are so I can solely strip and weld em but if the asphalt stuff doesn't come off I may exercise the blaster on the underside.

Side note, just found my rods out of round and more than 2 thou taper on all cylinders except one so sleeves and honing some rods is in order.
Thank good nass I work in an engine machining shop eh?
Cheers boys
God speed with the fab n racin

Liquid nitrogen and all the poo jumps off.
And rods that's easy--you have a Sunnen or Tobin-Arp machine?
And why sleeves when you can just bore--got some fancy pistones you wanna keep?

---

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.

Actually John they only have 5 thou to work with from new and they are at 4 on three. It's a 250 000 km sewing machine so since I can machine for free I might as well refurbish it with parts and start new. I'd like to upgrade internals but I don't need to cheat to finish although I'd like to (fn cars). Plus stock stuffs are cheap as f word.
You got any how to vids on liq nitrogen on seams??

---

All bridges burnt, island life is beauty

I only have till 5 my time to pick up liq nitrogen. plus the storage of it?

---

All bridges burnt, island life is beauty

Quote
Snidewhips
I only have till 5 my time to pick up liq nitrogen. plus the storage of it?

Get it deleiver and go straight to work, it'll cook off in just a couple of days.

But oh lordy how nice it works, everything else is jerkin the gherkin---and stinky and miserable.

---

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.

Quote
BJosephD
Iam no fabricator nor am i an engineer, i would consider stitch welding with the car on the ground with the doors shut tires on the ground. my reasoning is some car will bend a bit on jack stands to the point where the doors are tough to open. why not stitch it in its happy place. also worth mentioning i have heard it was not uncommon to braze the seams with coat hanger, but that was back in teh day when rallyists were men and the women...

On the other hand, with certain cars if you weld the cage in with the car sitting on the ground the doors won't shut. With Porsche 911's, for example, I put pin style jack stands in the jacking points (in the rocker just ahead of the rear wheels) and let the car teeter from there. Even then sometimes you need to shim the lower door hinge. With 944's however, there is no need to do this.