Im just trying to figure out which step to go my camaro and had some questions. How strucktually safe are the door and front end. i mean, do you still use the bumper renforcement? what about the doors, in a side impact would they protect you at all? can you use a fiberglass front end and still be "street legal" can you still mount normal lights, of would it be a major pita. The safest i think for the doors you be if you had a roll bar, but it would be a bitch to climb over. how much wieght you drop? and also are lexan windows street legal, im guessing the windshield isnt, but what about the side. Would the doors still be able to retain the factory door lock, power windows ect. im just trying to think of ways to shave pounds of the car.

 

i would say a glass front end would probably be ok for street, but i wouldn't run glass doors on a street driven car, unless you have a hefty cage with the door bars. i've never heard anything about people using lexan windshields, so i don't know. lexan windows would be fine. i don't know about using lexan windows in a stock metal door, but iirc, you have to use lexan windows with glass doors and they are fixed (can't be rolled down)

 

ttt

 

i dont know this first hand but i believe lexan is a no no because it gets scratched up and looks really bad really easily....As far as the fiberglass stuff id stay away from the doors but everything else shouldnt really matter....but also think okay fiberglass breaks easy but how much safer do you feel with a thin piece of sheet metal? Doesnt seem to make much difference to me.

 

fiber glass doors are suicide, there is no reinforcment or a saftey bar to keep you from the car smashing through your door.

fiberglass front ends are cool as well as lexan windows, get a lexan hatch if you want to lose some weight lol.

 

On the subject of fiberglass saftey.

My dune buggy is a tub style, reinforced, completely fiberglass, scooby doo Sharky looking thing. Complete cage, no top.

I was on a corner, taking video of my buddy buddy broad sliding in his VW baja bug with open front fenders. His motor flexed, a spark plug wire popped out of its little clamp, and seated between the throttle lever, and the body of the carb. Stuck wide open.

His front being so light, he turned the tires as hard as he could but they just plowed. He hit me in the rear (my rear tires) Climbed up the side of my body(buggy body).

The fiberglass body bowed about 3 inches before it gave out, and split wide open. The only thing that kept his bug from driving right over me was the fact that the front of his bug wouldn't fit between the top of the roll cage, and the bar I had welded in where a door would go on a regular bug.

If that door bar hadn't been there, the bug would have been implanted in my buggy underneath the top roll bar and the floor.

He basically t-boned me, without the bar the two rigs would have made a lower case t he would have been in one door and out the other.

If your going to a fiberglass door, front end, or top PLEASE PLEASE weld in at the very least some C shaped channel mid door, and some cros bracing in the front. Sheet mtal doesnt look like much, but fiberglass is like brittle cardboard ;(

 

Boiled down these are the two most important things to take into consideration...

 

that is exactly what i was thinking.

 

sheet matal is designed to work together in a crash.

The fiber glass would just break, the frame and bumper would still be there, but it would be questionable how safe such a thing would be on the srtreet. i was thinking of doing the same thing, I never got around to it. It's only a pita if you don't have a plan, would it lift off...or open like a vette? The fenders aren't very heavy. The nosed is moderatly heavy but not too bad, the hood can be heavy if it is steel, the aluminum ones are not heavy at all. I wouldn't say it was worth it to save wieght, the hatch glass is a good idea. I'd like to see one on a street car though, I think it would be very brave to do.

 

fourth gen doors are fiberglass so are some on saturns doors as long as you have the intrusion bar still safely attached in the door frame i dont thing thered be a serious problem sure its not as strong as sheet metal, also if your looking to save weight fourth gen doors are almost as heavy as ours so its kinda pointless to go fiberglass

 

theyre about just as heavy because all the internals are the same, if not better/stronger/heavier. the actual outside of the door is pretty thin iirc. so doors not really worth it imo.

 

As far as I know lexan windshields arn't legal in any states. Also all fiber glass doors I've seen are desined for race so there set up for metal framed lexan windows not for factory setups.