Capri drag car roll cage.

[donsrods]

For the past month or so my Sons and I have been installing a 10 point roll cage in my Son Don's 84 Capri. It is going to be a drag/sometimes street car with a 460 that will probably get a 514 stroker kit in it.

We have never done a roll cage before and Don ordered his from Summit. Although it is a kit there is really a lot of cutting and fitting to get it to fit right. Don only has one day a week that he can go to the shop so we have been just taking it easy and getting small parts done every time we get together.

We have had the NHRA rulebook handy to make sure we are doing it to pass inspection. It should be good for 8.50 seconds, way faster than he will need, but at least he will never have to redo it if the car gets faster over time.

Here are some pictures of where we ended up tonight. We still have to put one more diagonal brace from the seat belt bar down on the drivers side, a dash bar under the dash, and two door bars. We won't do the door bars until he gets some interior tin work finished to make it easier to climb in and out while working on it.

Don

And the big block Ford in a Fox Capri is kinda like 10 pounds of something in a 5 pound bag.

 

[Tim...Ok]

Nice work on the cage..Not one of my favorite jobs to do..

 

[Dirtyrat]

Definitely nice work on the cage, and shoehorning in the BBF

 

[Gregster]

very nice looking

 

[butchman_3]

cage looks good

all i can say about the cage is triangles are your friend, and with it being your son, if it looks like you might need another bar, add it. here is a chassis we done for the high maintenance monster truck, granted this is all 2" D.O.M. 120, 156, and 188. but youll get my drift. and with the seats, i always build the seat mounts from the cage, ive seen floor pans buckle and rip the mounts out which then your belts are useless. cool that its a father son project, dont hear about that stuff much anymore

 

[donsrods]

Thanks guys. Since we had never done one before we spent a lot of time sitting and thinking as we went along. Once we got the main hoop, the halo overhead, and the windshield bars welded in place it got pretty easy from that point on..........just a matter of notching bars and adding them to the main structure.

We wouldn't want to do these every day, not the easiest job we have done, but we are doing it the right way, just doing a little bit every Tuesday night. He has no time schedule so we are just taking our time and enjoying it. We have modified the kit a lot in the name of additional strength and safety.

We will be doing this all over again on my other Son's Fox Mustang, but he is going even further. He has cut out sections of the floor and ran 2 x 2 steel all the way from the front to the back as subframe connectors, and he is going to tub it and use a Pro Street rear. In that one he is going to do a 14 point cage.

Seeing all this roll bar work going on makes me want to build a drag altered, but I have to get my rpu done first.

Don

 

[butchman_3]

ive built several

ive built several cages in dirt cars including mustangs, pintos and s-10's then all the monsters i have helped build, it looks like you guys are doing an awesome job, if ya need any help with the mustang let me know, i can give ya some pointers.

 

[donsrods]

Thanks, Butchman, I appreciate the offer. It is actually going pretty well and is starting to look like something now. If we get stuck I will yell for help though.

Don and I were laughing last night because we would grind something smooth and think it was perfect but then Dan would do a little more grinding on it. He drives us nuts with being so anal, but I have to say it is coming out nicer because of his involvement.

Don

 

[butchman_3]

know that feeling

when we do the monster truck chassis' we do not allow more then an 1/8" gap anywhere on the tubing or the joints, ya it gets aggravating and there has been tubes we have had to redo because of it, but the finished product is so much cleaner and professional. youll be happier taking the extra time with the finished product

 

[derbyking]

mt tech tip ive done alot of tube notching over the years,and when i first started i wore out several cheap notchers.after trying to rebuild the cheap ones and adding bearings to them ect i finally caved in and bought a jmr notcher from trick tools,about $600.ive used it for the last 6 years and built ALOT of stuff and its as good as new. my buddy bought a jd2 and we used it to build one atv chassis and it was already loose.JMR has the best manual notcher out there imo.a good notcher will make life way easier.after notching i always grind the thin edge of the cope back to gain back the wall thickness for a stronger welded joint.

 

[TiredIronGRB]

Great looking cage.

 

[Mike S.]

The cage looks great guys. That's definitely one place to take your time and get it right. I'll bet the guys in this video gave their fabricator a big hug after they crawled outta their car.

http://youtu.be/on3RxOpGNYA

 

[bob w]

Ditto on a great looking cage. Remember, no grinding on the welds.

It's a good feeling when NHRA tech finds nothing wrong.

That definitely will be the case with the Capri after the Dan, Don & Don treatment.

 

[Flying Rat]

Great looking work. I did a Fox body car in the late '80's for the street only. I used a six point roll bar kit from Chris Alston. I put together a 514 from a speed-o-motive kit and a turbo 400 with adapter and a 3000 stall conv. At the time I raced sprint cars and I used to mount all the used up sprint car left rear tires for one night of street fun.(had to mini tub it for that) The 8.8 rear held up with some moser axles. The downfall was when I got a 150 hp NOS kit and got a little carried away. It was no lightweight @ about 3200 lbs with a steel head 514 and the weight bias was all screwed up but it was still fun to shock the tuner cars. I sold it as a roller and was fortunate that I never got any tickets. Keep us posted.

 

[Neverdone]

Looks good. One of my friends used to have a capri. Thing looked ragged out, many years used and abused but it would still out run most anything around!!! (motor may have had a little help )

 

[donsrods]

Thanks guys for all the input and suggestions. Last night we finally got done with the last bar installed. [cl We still have to do the door bars but are holding off on that until Don gets his interior work wrapped up. It would be hard to work in there with the door bars in the way. He is thinking about swing out bars to make it easier to drive the car on the street, but we can figure that out later.

Here is where we ended up last night. We feel really good and that Don will be safe with the way we did it.

Don

 

[butchman_3]

looks great

cage looks great, one thing i see and this is just my opinion, but the rear hoop directly behind the seats, might want to look at a tube to go from the corners at the top to the center of your mid bar that runs from side to side. only reason why i say that is for if some reason, if the car would have a roll over or hit on the upper part of the roof at the side, it could case the top of the halo bar to shift. like i said, its just my opinion but maybe look at it and maybe add them in. but all in all looks like a well crafted and well thought out cage.

 

[donsrods]

I'm trying to envision where you mean exactly. Could you elaborate a little more ?

Dan wanted to run two additional bars from the shoulder bar down to the upper torque boxes (which are alread reinforced with battle boxes) but Don didn't want them. He wants to keep as much room in the back a possible as he plans to carry his baritone sax and band equipment sometimes if he drives it to a gig.

I'd like to hear more about the bars you mentioned though.

Don

 

[bob w]

Don, Looks like you are good to run 10.00 the way it sits. In fact, Tator, here on RRR has certified to 8.50 with a cage with the same tubes (door bars included). That's fast enough to get that sax from gig to gig.

In my Anglia I put an "X" brace between the rear down tubes. Wish I hadn't as they get in the way.

 

[donsrods]

Bob, yeah, it should be good for 8.5 once we get the door bars in. We also talked about that same X brace and he felt it would limit visibility. The roll cage already has created some blind spots.

Don