Rage13

I was thinking about this at work today.. From the factory they just spot welded everything, but what if you went and welded all the way around all the parts that they just spot welded? You think it would help and hold up?

jocww

that would be alot of work way too much work. also i dont think it would help out that much or enuff to warrant all the welding

drain89

iTrader: (10)

I definately think it would help, but the time you spent or money to have someone do it.....I don't know if it would be worth it when you could weld on a set of SFC's which would offer more gains. Some guys over in japan did it though.
Also, you'd better be ready to strip and then POR-15 every place you welded, because you're inviting RUST anytime you weld....especially along seams where 2 panels overlap and join.

MYBLUZ

I dont think its the fact that its spot welded, its the fact that its basiclly sheet metal, and not a rigid frame rail. Its flimsy and light weight. Have you ever tried to seperate a spot weld? Not very easy. I think all you would accomplish is warping the unibody, or at the very least,waste alot of time. SFC is all that is needed.

MrDude_1

waste or not, when i pull the interior for rollbar and paint, im going to do it in some areas....

biggest place i want to hit is where the factory very bracing is just poprivited to my car.


i figure, it cant hurnt, and it'll add MAYBE a pound to the car.... if that.

so it cant hurt.

Rage13

oh well, was just an idea.. i wounder if those guys in Japan noticed any difference

@ZZKKER

iTrader: (1)

it helps more than people give credit. not every weld on the car needs done, only the ones that hold the car together, liker around the strut towers, around the back of the car were the shocks/ spring perches are, along the side of the car, where the firewall and the floor meets. i live in IL so welding everthing was not a good ideah for rust prevention, i already had to weld in new floor in several places, so i did were it ws most needed, around the sprinf/shock perches, and the floor to back pan weld as those places are high stress area's.

if you welded everything on the car, it would be like there were sfcs on the car. the japs weld there cars and add a 6-8 point roll bar for there drift cars. it works very well.

thanks
anthony

Kontrax

i wouldnt go doing that unless you have serious power. you really think your gonna break the factory welds with a stock car?( i dont mean you directly ) hell even an 11 second car wont break the welds. you always have subs to weld in also. thats why companies offer different chassy parts and cages so strenghten the frame.... and the bodies are far from lightweight

CrazyHawaiian

Well some guys want a stiff chassis for roadracing or drifting (not 1/4 mile). Its not so much an issue of welds breaking, but more of preventing flex. When weight is important, seam welding makes alot of sense because you stiffen up the chassis with little to no added weight. You still would want to do SFC's and a light cage for the ultimate in stiff chassis, but seam welding does help. I'm working up a deal to buy a 88 RS chassis for $200. This will be the backup shell for my drift car. When I'm not working on the drift car, I want to be in the backup shell welding the seams and the rollcage. When I eventually total my current shell, I'm gonna swap everything over to this worked 88 chassis and see if it makes a difference (lighter cage and welded seams).

Rage13

going to be puting in Spohn sub frames and 8 point chrome moly roll bar soon, will add a strut tower brace too, but after the motor swap so i know it will fit. you think welding the seams will make any difference after these mods?

CrazyHawaiian

I think it will, but I'm no expert on this by any means. Every roadracing series I've seen that requires you retain the stock unibody, majority of the cars are seam welded. They are also **** about weight, so they run the minimum ammount of rollcage material needed (but still keeping it strong) to save weight. So weather or not you should do it depends on how **** you want to get about having a stiff chassis with minimum weight I guess. I think at the minimum you would want SFC's and a cage, so you should be good to go with your current plans. I'm pretty **** about having the least ammount of weight possible, and the stiffest chassis possible, so I plan to do it to my next chassis. Unfortunately I dont have time to do it to my current chassis. For all I know, it might not make a big difference in the long run, but I dont see it hurting me either. Only downside is the ammount of time and effort it takes to get all that work done. I wont know how much of a difference it will make untill I can compare a car with just SFC's and a cage to a car with SFC's, a cage, and the seams welded. I think the car with the seams welded and a lighter cage will be better because it will be lighter overall.

SWells

if your not seeing any signs of the welds breaking then I doubt that you are accomplishing much. If you want to stiffer the unibody do that with additional metal in the right places (engine brace, sfc's, wonderbar, xframe, lca's...the list goes on). After all, it the sheet metal not the welds that are flexing.

@ZZKKER

iTrader: (1)

you are correct but the meatal is flexing where there are no welds. do chassis welding in the right locations will make more of a diff than most people think.

granted, sfc's or a roll cage will do more, but if you are racing in a stock class and the only mod you can do is a 4 point bar and chassis welding then that could be the win or lose difference.

thanks
anthony

LiveandLetDrive

Quite a few 3rd gen Corvettes have had this done. It's a hell of a lot easier if you're doing a body-off restoration I'm sure, but alot can be done with it on. Those who have done it report noticeable gains in stiffness, like the guy above said, it's not about the welds breaking. Other things like strut-brace etc. help too, as does a cage, I don't know how your suspensions mount, but on our cars, the attachment points badly need gussets for stiffness, they are actually know to fail.

-Chris

CrazyHawaiian

Check this out for some pics of a 3rd gen being seam welded:

http://www.advanceauto.jp/project_3rdcamaro.htm

Thats a website for a company in Japan called Advance Auto redoing a 91 Camaro for roadracing. I think they go a little overboard connecting the cage to the roof, but you get the idea. Man those guys are good at welding!

laiky

Wow, i wish i had thought of that when my car was gutted!!!

those guys did a great job. love to see the exhaust

g_ride

If it counts for anything one of my instructors used to be a rally racer and he said that before racing every unibody car he ever owned he would essentially gut it, and weld every seam under and in the car, and it apparently stiffeded it up an awful lot.

Tony89GTA

iTrader: (7)

Is it me or is that not a stock wing on that camaro. Check it out

MrDude_1

ive done the best i can do by PC to translate the page:
http://josh.swoca.net/board/mrdude/j...translated.htm

if anyone wants to read.....

Monster

MrDude_1 - Thanks for the translated page. I had figured out most of the pictures but the translation helped with the details...like the imputities of the weld & how they were mocking up the bar with rod. I like the use of 'quarried' for either fabricated or cut. It makes sense and when you think about it...

89RsPower!

wow japanese people working on a real car.. and they did one hell of a job too..

MrDude_1

i just like how they think for themselves.... look at the strut tower brace...

notice anything?


when you have the one bolt holding it to the brackets.. it can let the towers still pivoit.... like a parallelogram. but they added a 2nd brace mount point to each side..

slick no?

Rembrandt

a lightweight stiffening alternative also I think of Japanese origin is special hardening stuctural foam injected into the chassis voids and inclusions.

i'm not sure whether racing classes allow it, but here are is an article from sport compact car on this website (they used some in their 300ZX):

http://www.stormowners.com/GSOPDatac...fa/view/id/110

also here, scroll down:
http://www.sportcompactcarweb.com/pr...scc_proj300zx/

and here is the place that makes the special foam:

http://www.itwfoamseal.com/auto_aftermarket.htm


apparently it works, is a neat "stealth" mod; I wonder if it brings any anti-corrosion properties.

you can get higher density, higher strength levels of the foam depending on what you want.

anyone tried this?

Rembrandt

and wow that Japanese Camaro is wicked!

i need to learn how to weld. I have wanted to fully strip, seam weld, and install a gusseted roll cage forever, custom made myself. that is just awesome work. then do an awesome repaint.

it some of the bottom photos where they show the engine, it looks like it has 18 degree heads on it but I could just be fooling myself.

Rembrandt

that has to be my dream-Camaro, except I'd want EFI and silver paint.

MrDude_1

wow thats intresting.

makes me wonder.... convertibles have this big hollow sheetmetal channel running under the groundeffects...
i wonder how much it would help if you foam filled that....

hot69z

almost all the new german imports have solid welded aluminum chassi based on the fact that it greatly reduces flex the problem with doing such things with steal is the rot factor...
The reason why its a problem is if you weld these gaps solid you will not be able to relive the moisture traped inside the pannels. The reason why this is such a problem is when you weld the seams the sut left on the weld is acidic and will help with the rotting of the pannel when moisture is added.

laiky

"almost all the new german imports have solid welded aluminum chassi based on the fact that it greatly reduces flex"

HUH?

hot69z

Refraise: almost all aluminum chassi's are welded solid at the seam because it greatly reduces flexing. the reason this is not done with sheet metal chassi's is because moisture can be trapped inside the steal pannels and cause premature rotting of supports

OneBadZ4U

So seam welding is a bad idea??

oil pan 4

iTrader: (1)

Seam welding a good thing. The guys that made the D1 drifting new chevy GTO with the LS6 striped it and welding the seams.
Other things they do over here are weld reinforcements on the strut tower, they all have a strut brace, I see a lot of cracked strut towers over here too.
I wouldn't full weld seams, I would leave small gaps along the bead.
I ordered a WS6 sway bar, trying to order a tube K member also.
I want to get a after market wonder bar and copy it, but make it out of Titanium. I want it to handle like a dream and be light.

OneBadZ4U

Ok so its ok to seam weld. What about trapping moisture?? What about if your car is gutted and on jack stands??

Xhiron

I do believe its called 'stitch' welding. You don't need to do a full bead, but a spot weld o nthe seam ever inch or so makes a big difference.

stenseltizm

iTrader: (1)

actually it's not a good idea to weld an aluminum chassi. The amount of material you would need to add to counter the loss in strength from welding outweighs any savings in weight from the aluminum. The best thing is bonded hydroformed fully boxed rails, with crossmembers that run completely through the main rails.

Just my 2 cents. I think Lexus and some others do this.

rx7speed

yes I'm aware this is an older post but saw it referenced somewhere else


the idea behind seam welding isn't to make the seal welds stronger but to prevent the flex

when you have welds that are spaced further aprt from each other you have a gap in the middle that nothing supports so that gap in the middle is able to flex and bend
when you seam weld that area it binds it all the way through so the whole section now is giving support to prevent flex not just one little spot

it's almost like your sub frame connectors. without them your not goin to brake the subframe or anything normally but there is that big gap in the middle that is allowed to flex just like one your spot weld you have that big gap in thie middle that is allowed to flex
but you seam weld it now the area between the welds is now supporting and preventin flex just like a subframe connector prevents taht gap between the subframes from flexing


same idea more or less it isn't done to prevent the spot weld from brekaing just make it to where more area of the car is lendin support to prevent flex

Streetstuff

So this is old but whatever. Does anyone have a new link or pics of the Japanese Camaro? The old link and the translated one don't work.

oil pan 4

iTrader: (1)

The article I read about the Japanese camaro was written by a US car magizine.
I was living in Japan when I read the article, so that would have been some time before 2006 for me.
If I remember correctly it was kind of an old article even then.