1967 RS Duramax Camaro

Tobin said:
Those aren't structural welds. For your sake, I hope you don't have to rely on them. They would never pass a weld test.

Not trying to be a A$$ but for safety stuff.............

Is a removable harness bar NHRA legal? I don't think I would want that removable. That has severely weakened the bar in compression. Your diagonal needs to pass through the harness bar. How are you going to pull that off?

Tobin
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To be clear, when I stitch weld, my welds never stop glowing red in between pulls of the trigger, so it's not a cold weld on top of another cold weld. I'm not saying it's the strongest, best all around method, but it works for me and many people I know, including professional welders. I am not a professional welder, nor have I ever claimed to be.

I read through the nhra general regulations about roll cages. As far as the welds go, all it says it must be done by approved tig heliarc process or mig wire feed process, and grinding is prohibited. I google searched the approved mig wire feed process and came up empty handed. I'm also not sure what you meant by my diagonal needs to pass through the harness bar.

http://www.nhra.com/UserFiles/file/General_Regulations.pdf

As far as my swing out door bars, they are legal. I couldn't determine in the nhra general regulations whether or not the removable back brace is legal, and Chassisworks website doesn't that they are or aren't. If the swing out door bars are legal, I can't see why the back brace being removable would be a big deal. Perhaps the fact that I had to sleeve it to make it removable would make it illegal, but I don't know. If the door bars are severely weakened by making them removable, then the back brace would be as equally weakened.

My point is that my friends have built rock crawlers and jumped them, rolled them countless times, with interior cages and exterior cages using this welding process, and every single one if those welds are still holding strong. If they're strong enough to withstand a 5,000 lb truck being jumped and rolled over rocks, they're strong enough for me.

In the end, it doesn't matter to me whether or not my cage is nhra certified or legal, because I have no desire to travel the drag racing circuit and compete. I just want to go to my local track and race there. And I'm positive I will be legal there, because I have seen roll cages and chassis fabrication far below what my camaro has and they passed inspection.
 
dslhtrdr said:
To be clear, when I stitch weld, my welds never stop glowing red in between pulls of the trigger, so it's not a cold weld on top of another cold weld. I'm not saying it's the strongest, best all around method, but it works for me and many people I know, including professional welders. I am not a professional welder, nor have I ever claimed to be.

I read through the nhra general regulations about roll cages. As far as the welds go, all it says it must be done by approved tig heliarc process or mig wire feed process, and grinding is prohibited. I google searched the approved mig wire feed process and came up empty handed. I'm also not sure what you meant by my diagonal needs to pass through the harness bar.

http://www.nhra.com/UserFiles/file/General_Regulations.pdf

As far as my swing out door bars, they are legal. I couldn't determine in the nhra general regulations whether or not the removable back brace is legal, and Chassisworks website doesn't that they are or aren't. If the swing out door bars are legal, I can't see why the back brace being removable would be a big deal. Perhaps the fact that I had to sleeve it to make it removable would make it illegal, but I don't know. If the door bars are severely weakened by making them removable, then the back brace would be as equally weakened.

My point is that my friends have built rock crawlers and jumped them, rolled them countless times, with interior cages and exterior cages using this welding process, and every single one if those welds are still holding strong. If they're strong enough to withstand a 5,000 lb truck being jumped and rolled over rocks, they're strong enough for me.

In the end, it doesn't matter to me whether or not my cage is nhra certified or legal, because I have no desire to travel the drag racing circuit and compete. I just want to go to my local track and race there. And I'm positive I will be legal there, because I have seen roll cages and chassis fabrication far below what my camaro has and they passed inspection.
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Your car traveling down the track at 100+ mph has a lot more force than a 5000lb crawler bouncing over rocks at 10 mph.

The welds are cold. MIG has cold starts. The tack tack method is great for sheet metal, not structural welds. Are the welders professional welders or certified welders? I have seen a lot of "professional" welders that do horrible work.

I guess no diagonal bar required for NHRA. SCCA/NASA requires a diagonal bar.

As you wish....just remember your life might depend on it one day. Just because it passes inspection doesn't mean it is right.

Tobin
 
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Tobin said:
Your car traveling down the track at 100+ mph has a lot more force than a 5000lb crawler bouncing over rocks at 10 mph.

The welds are cold. MIG has cold starts. The tack tack method is great for sheet metal, not structural welds. Are the welders professional welders or certified welders? I have seen a lot of "professional" welders that do horrible work.

I guess no diagonal bar required for NHRA. SCCA/NASA requires a diagonal bar.

As you wish....just remember your life might depend on it one day. Just because it passes inspection doesn't mean it is right.

Tobin
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Interesting... What welding process is used on 99% of the welds on your vehicle? Pretty sure it's not TIG, SAW or SMAW...
 
awesome thread, one of those ones where you finally get to the last page and go AWWWWWW....

he makes a point, Mig is not necessarily the best method for welding cages.

BUT.... you can tell he has good penetration from the discoloration, they will be fine
 
I'm impressed! Subscribed, and I'm not to far north of you!
 
ahale2772 said:
awesome thread, one of those ones where you finally get to the last page and go AWWWWWW....

he makes a point, Mig is not necessarily the best method for welding cages.

BUT.... you can tell he has good penetration from the discoloration, they will be fine
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MIG welding IS perfectly fine for welding Mild steel (1020 DOM) cages, it is not good for chromoly cages (4130). The HAZ on those welds is actually terrible. If that is 4130 material, it is that much worse.

Like I said, do as you wish. I would never had said anything except that it is for a piece of safety equipment that his life might depend on one day. That is something you don't want to skimp on.

Tobin
 
If you think that's bad, you should see the cage in my car.
Well it's non-existent, so i think it's great, looks gold, and despite the way he welded it, should be left alone now.
 
Tobin said:
Your car traveling down the track at 100+ mph has a lot more force than a 5000lb crawler bouncing over rocks at 10 mph.

The welds are cold. MIG has cold starts. The tack tack method is great for sheet metal, not structural welds. Are the welders professional welders or certified welders? I have seen a lot of "professional" welders that do horrible work.

I guess no diagonal bar required for NHRA. SCCA/NASA requires a diagonal bar.

As you wish....just remember your life might depend on it one day. Just because it passes inspection doesn't mean it is right.

Tobin
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I'm not trying to be a smart ass, but they're going faster than 10mph jumping boulders in a rock race. And yes, I know for a fact that one of the professional welders I know is certified, and I believe the other guy is too, but not positive. I would post pictures of they're work but this is not the place or time for it.

Tobin said:
MIG welding IS perfectly fine for welding Mild steel (1020 DOM) cages, it is not good for chromoly cages (4130). The HAZ on those welds is actually terrible. If that is 4130 material, it is that much worse.

Like I said, do as you wish. I would never had said anything except that it is for a piece of safety equipment that his life might depend on one day. That is something you don't want to skimp on.

Tobin
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The tubing is mild steel. If I could afford chromoly, I wouldn't still be building this car. I'm building on more of a budget than most people would believe. The cage kit I bought from Chassisworks cost less than $300. You can go a lot further with less money when you do the work yourself, which everybody here already knows.

You can say whatever you want about it. I'm pretty darn proud of all of it, and I feel perfectly safe with it.
 
JoshH said:
The car looks good with the motor in there.
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Thanks Josh. I swear I'm going to get on duramaxdiesels.com and start cruising around on there soon.

ahale2772 said:
awesome thread, one of those ones where you finally get to the last page and go AWWWWWW....

he makes a point, Mig is not necessarily the best method for welding cages.

BUT.... you can tell he has good penetration from the discoloration, they will be fine
Click to expand...

He does make a point and I acknowledged it, but you are correct about the discoloration on the tubing. I feel like I have plenty of penetration everywhere.

Rustin said:
I'm impressed! Subscribed, and I'm not to far north of you!
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Thank you! I plan on attending the Jefferson State Diesel Nationals up there next year. Maybe I'll see you up there.

24vriviera said:
If you think that's bad, you should see the cage in my car.
Well it's non-existent, so i think it's great, looks gold, and despite the way he welded it, should be left alone now.
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Thank you.

6.0 p-stroke said:
This car is awesome! I wish I had your resources and skills. Keep up the good work!
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Thanks, it really pays off working at a shop with the right tools and friends/coworkers with good skills and advice. It's helped me tremendously.
 
Its all about penetration, he clearly has enough heat, and enough material on the weld.

Its not as strong as a proper tig, but that being said, 90% of the guys out there making tiny pretty tig welds aren't doing it right either, not when there is barely any filler on the weld and all they are going for is looks. Also, he fit the pipe propperly, many guys use mig as and excuse to fill gaps from cutting pipe too short..ect..

I'm not trying to argue with ya, I've got a mini cooper (original body style) that I did a cage on, mig'd it together, and I totally agree that it would not be spec, but when the tubing is damn near glowing at the end of the weld... You know its not going to break, its my car, i'm trusting my welds to do the job.
 
ahale2772 said:
Its all about penetration, he clearly has enough heat, and enough material on the weld.

Its not as strong as a proper tig, but that being said, 90% of the guys out there making tiny pretty tig welds aren't doing it right either, not when there is barely any filler on the weld and all they are going for is looks. Also, he fit the pipe propperly, many guys use mig as and excuse to fill gaps from cutting pipe too short..ect..

I'm not trying to argue with ya, I've got a mini cooper (original body style) that I did a cage on, mig'd it together, and I totally agree that it would not be spec, but when the tubing is damn near glowing at the end of the weld... You know its not going to break, its my car, i'm trusting my welds to do the job.
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Good point, well said.

bikeluver43 said:
The car looks amazing, but I didn't realize I was on competitionwelding.com
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I agree, I'm tired of talking about it and would like to move on.
 
Pulled the motor again today and finished welding up the motor mounts. I think I figured out how I'm going to build the tranny mount, and I also have a solid plan for shortening the lower oil pan for better ground clearance. I tightened up my coil overs to raise the front end up a little to aid that too.

Slowly but surely, it'll get there. I have set a date of completion (or as complete as possible) for May 18th, 2013. The Jefferson State Diesel Nationals will hopefully be my first time out and about with the car and people can see it. Wish me luck and keep your fingers crossed.
 
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