The Triumph Dolomite Club - Discussion Forum

The Number One Club for owners of Triumph's range of small saloons from the 1960s and 1970s.
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 Post subject: Seam welding
PostPosted: Fri Apr 20, 2007 5:59 pm 
I am planning to use my dolly for track days and auto tests.
I was thinking of seam welding some of the body to improve the rigidity and stop it from getting pulled apart by the hihg loads.
Has anyone any experience or opinions of this on here.


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Fri Apr 20, 2007 9:17 pm 
In my opinion - a bad idea - transfers load to parts of the shell NOT designed to cope with it. The Dolomite was designed just as people became aware of the idea of crash protection, manufacturing parts of the shell to take specific loadings in the event of an accident. Modify this (by seam welding) and you can get all kinds of unknown stresses and loadings.

Best idea is to fit a suspension turret brace and maybe reinforce a few certain other choice points, should see you good :)

You really shouldn't have that much problem with the shell, unless you're putting obscene torque through it (as Darren will testify!)


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Fri Apr 20, 2007 10:39 pm 
it is far more complicated than most people think.
For a good seem welded body you have to calculate about a month of work (evening time)
A big part is thoroughly removing the damping material what is in many places you want to weld.
For a good result you have to dismantle the whole car and at least you need a devise to roll the body over, or as we do, like a pig on the grill.
Never a total weld but about 1 till1.5 inch long parts with about 1 till 2 inch in between.
the thought is to get the car body stiffer, but for a slightly upgraded road car i real wonder if all the effort is worth it, because to complete the job you will need a welded in cage also, this brings real stiffness ext ext ext.
The standard suspension cant cope with this and probable the car will heavily under steer in the first corner.

The best bet is to build a tracday car out of an low mileage lady owned 1300 or 1500 I'm not kidding.
To start with you have to buy the 2 most important parts, TIME and SPACE and if they are difficult to obtain I would go for a set wheel / tires and some upgraded suspensions and brakes and enjoy.

Hans


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sat Apr 21, 2007 2:13 pm 
Well I have all ready reinforced many of the suspension components to cope with the increased loads. I intend to remove most of the sound proofing any way to save some weight and I have a spit I made last year so that I can roll the car over, time is not really a concern. I’m going to fit new sills to it and clean up all of the underbody and I’m seriously looking at a weld in roll cage.
It seems to me that if I’m going to do it now is the time whilst the car is gutted.
Have you done this to yours then Hans.
Thanks for you thoughts.


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sat Apr 21, 2007 10:17 pm 
Both cars are build from a bare shell
The first one is the new shell from Sprint Spares what came only in primer and had an special one of cage build by Safety Devise, this cage is connected to the body at 16 places even up into the roof line, rather stable.
The good thing is it has its own humiliation also.

The other car is build out of an 1500 with 40 k miles what we bougth in England.
We did the cleaning and welding our self but had the cage build in at Wiegers cage builders in Germany from chrome steel including all the official paperwork Fia approved about 2500 euro.
To have it Fia approved a cage can only be build by a few selected and approved company's so we went for one of the best and delivered the shell connected at the spit what they liked very much and so kept the price a bit down.

This car is even noticeable more stable than the already very stable safety devise car, and because of the chrome steel cage also slightly lighter although total identical around 860 Kg

Hans


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sat Apr 21, 2007 10:17 pm 
Both cars are build from a bare shell
The first one is the new shell from Sprint Spares what came only in primer and had an special one of cage build by Safety Devise, this cage is connected to the body at 16 places even up into the roof line, rather stable.
The good thing is it has its own humiliation also.

The other car is build out of an 1500 with 40 k miles what we bougth in England.
We did the cleaning and welding our self but had the cage build in at Wiegers cage builders in Germany from chrome steel including all the official paperwork Fia approved about 2500 euro.
To have it Fia approved a cage can only be build by a few selected and approved company's so we went for one of the best and delivered the shell connected at the spit what they liked very much and so kept the price a bit down.

This car is even noticeable more stable than the already very stable safety devise car, and because of the chrome steel cage also slightly lighter although total identical around 860 Kg

Hans


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sat Apr 21, 2007 10:18 pm 
Oops, something went wrong, sorry.


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