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Wondering where that roof came from? It turns out there was a tweaked-beyond-being-sellable sheet of lightweight aluminum that came with our car. It didn't take much imagination to figure out how to make it useful.
To get the seat mounted as far down and as far back as possible, we cut out the stock mounts and welded in newer, lower, farther backer ones. For the front mounts, this was relatively simple.
For the rear mounts, we actually dropped through the floor and had to weld our angle-iron crossmember to the underside of the floor. It was getting a little uncomfortable working up over our heads on the lift, so we took advantage of the fact that every fluid reservoir in the car was dry and simply rolled the car on its side, football hooligan style.
There's a certain freedom in a car whose bodywork doesn't matter. Surprisingly, though, rolling the car on its side did almost no damage to the body. The rubber wheel chock against the A-pillar held most of the bodywork off the ground. Only about a 1″ square patch of fender actually touched down, leaving a slight flat spot in the rear fender. That spot has been crashed into 5 or 6 times now, and is now hidden under about 15 layers of house paint.
Over the years, and nearly 20 LeMons races this car has campaigned in, some rules governing its bodywork have changed, forcing us to gradually add four superfluous body panels.
Someone at the insurance company must have watched a sprint car crash, because suddenly our open-wheel configuration was no bueno. The sudden fender requirement sent us begging to Spec Miata-racing friends, who donated their too-bent-for-pretty-boy-racing used fenders. Yes, that is an NB fender on our NA, and no, they don't really fit…
A few races later, hood and door requirement appeared. Someone apparently thinks hoods will contain fires, though I prefer the ability to see the source of the fire without having to touch the car. Regardless, the new rule required something hoodlike to appear over our engine. Not wanting to waste a perfectly good Miata hood, we called up 2nd Chance Roadster, and asked if they had anything too damaged to sell to normal people.
