My cage is home Safe & Sound!

[Faron]

I have been whining and complaining that my Pans and Roll Cage were at the Painter for about a week. Guess what I am excited to say that they are back in my garage and look GREAT! I am very happy! I only asked for the pans to be painted black, and he used bed liner. It looks great!!! The Roll Cage looks better then I expected as well. He filled in the welds, to sort of smooth them out. They are not perfect, but they look very good. My next door neighbor girl said the color I chose looked like it was the same color as Mac-N-Cheese. Its the same color as my high school, maybe I should paint the body white rather then Black! You tell me what you think!

[MURZ]

Finally! I have been waiting all day for those pics. ...In my best Chico and the Man voice....."Lookin' good, Lookin' good.
Chico and the man....wow that dates me. HEHEHEHE

Paint that puppy the same color as the cage!!! I love it.

MURZ

[Aquabuggy]

As Paris Hilton would say THATS HOT!!

[Mike & Mel]

Hey, what does everyone think about the crossed top braces? Any concerns? Thinking about doing ours similar to that.

[blackthree4me]

first off I want to say I like the color good choice
looks great
now for the bad news
your a glutin for punishment arnt you LOL
I would take a real hard look at the mouting points for the cage
what is the purpouse for the cage ? Looks or safety
I would hope safety
the way you have it set in the picks it is going to mount up to .060"
floor pan material. Bad Idea. if the unthinkable should happen
it will rip thru that puppy in seconds flat causing the cage to drop in on you
go back to the fab shop and get the mounting brackets tied into the chassie some how mine mount up over the glass flange thru the floor thru a 1" square tube in the pan chanel and thru a 1/8" plate that sandwitchs everything together. and Im still concerned about stength
the rears are tied into the torsion housing bracket for xtra strenghth
I realy dont want to hammer on you it looks great !
but I would do somemore work on the mounting points
blackthree4me

[MURZ]

Like this? Hawkeye buggies did mine.

[bobaganoosh]

looks good,

can someone buy me one of those roll cage things, j/k

I'll put one in after I get my first head injury from a roll over.

mike

[Faron]

Looks... the odds of me driving this car to the point of a roll over is VERY bad. This buggy will never be a fast, or good handling car. I have 210bhp MINI Cooper S for that. My fast road racing car is my MINI, my REALLY Good looking car will be my Buggy! More show then Go! I guess what I am saying is that my Buggy is being built as a drivable show car!
On a side bar when I am finished with my Buggy is when I will start on my MINI, I am looking for 400bhp from my 4 banger. I have rode in one with 290bhp MINI WOW IT ROCKS!!!

[Faron]

Look... the odds of me driving this car to the point of a roll over is VERY bad. This buggy will never be a fast, or good handling car. I have 210bhp MINI Cooper S for that. My fast road racing car is my MINI, my REALLY Good looking car will be my Buggy! More show then Go! I guess what I am saying is that my Buggy is being built as a drivable show car!
On a side bar when I am finished with my Buggy is when I will start on my MINI, I am looking for 400bhp from my 4 banger. I have rode in one with 290bhp MINI WOW IT ROCKS!!!

[carlos del carpio]

Unfortunately, you CANNOT build these things with looks in mind, if you drive it at all, it MUST be for safety...sure, you're a safe and good driver, and of COURSE you will take care of the buggy, you built it, but how about the lady in the SUV putting on make-up while driving? The speeding teen racing in a truck? The guy in a car text messaging with a cell phone and driving? You gotta build it for safety, at some regard..

Now, in your case, get a piece of carboard

Trace the base mounts on the bottom of the roll cage..

Now, using a ruler, place it over the OUTSIDE EDGES of your tracing...

If you did it right, using a standard ruler, your tracing of the bases are about 1-inch wider than the actual bases...

Transfer that to sheet metal, the piece being at least 25% thicker than your base sheetmetal...

Once you get the sheetmetal cut, line it up UNDER your bases, transfer/mark the holes, and drill them out.

When you mount the cage, place these plates under the pan, and that will be a MINIMUM way of supporting the cage...

A better way would be the same procedures as above, but the piece you will transfer/cut will be a template of the entire pan, so it will "ring" around the bottom of the pan, better, and with precious cargo on board, why not???

[Faron]

Thanks guys, but I do have plates to go on each side of the pan. The only type of cage that is going to have a chance to stand up to the kind of thing you mentioned is a full cage like the one in the photo.

[Bill K]

Never thought my old car could be turning out to look so good. I agree, paint the whole car the color of the roll cage. I looks fantastic.

[Faron]

Thanks guys, but I do have plates to go on each side of the pan. I will feel as safe as I can feel in a fiberglass car. Besides what do you say to the guy who goes with a single roll bar, or no roll bar at all? The only type of cage that is going to have a chance at standing up to the kind of thing you mentioned is a full cage like the one in the photo. Lets be honest we are building fiberglass Dune Buggies, on a VW Bug pan. The VW Bug was never a safe vehicle to begin with, and we remove the body only to replace it with fiberglass.

[Faron]

Thanks Bill_K Once again that means a lot to have to have you say that. To be honest I really didn't like the BIG butt look on this buggy, but now that I have the Roll Cage all painted & and in place. I think it will work with the right paint job. I am going to bring the flames all the way to the back of the buggy without it looking gaudy. That's the trick of that BIG Butt rear end. How in the heck am I going to do this. Ohh well I have a TON of work to do before I think about how to do the flames! HaHaHa