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Visiting a shop to see what other vehicles are being worked on as well as what work environment is displayed can also be critically important. Going to a shop that is a mess with countless unfinished projects sitting around should set off warning bells. The quality of work might be great, but as most racers know, time is the enemy in more ways than one. Dropping your pride and joy off at a shop and not getting it back for 2 years severely limits time needed to finish a build! Visiting All Speed Innovations reinforces the confidence that their experience and accreditations provide. The shop is clean and organized with dedicated work areas for all customer cars with whiteboards and GSD (Get Shit Done) lists at each station.
So after a short period of time, a comprehensive PDF showed up from Pat at All Speed. In this PDF our cage build was outlined very thoroughly. All goals we discussed were outlined along with the rules and regulations that were required to be met by our racing sanctioning bodies. This helped keep everyone on the same page.
Further into the PDF, cool stuff I never expected showed up. A complete virutual cage was constructed and optimized for weight and strength. An estimate of weight based on tubing size was included. We wonder how our 206lb cage compares with the one in the Cyber Evo.
Pat also went through the trouble of showing the importance of front and rear strut tower integration to improve chassis stiffness.
A lot of attention was put into how loads would be transfered through the cage to ensure minimal risk of failure in the event of an accident.
We initally wanted to integratedthe A-pillar bar into the chassis. I got this idea from the WRC Builder's CRX Eric Hsu wrote about a few years back. The goal was to save a little weight and improve outward visibility. Pat was concerned about the idea and decided the best way to verify his concerns was to FEA the two designs. Needless to say, his method of gusseting won out and outward vision ended up being completely fine.So now you’ve picked your cage builder, what’s next? The design is often the most overlooked aspect of the build. Some builders specialize in one type of cage or another and think one design works for everyone. Each discipline of driving has different requirements of the chassis. Will there be a chance for roll over? Side impacts? Multiple cars on track? Falling off the sides of cliffs? These should all be taken into account. The Professional Awesome crew sees scary designs all the time, plenty of “What the hell?” moments and very rarely, “hmm, that seems pretty sweet.” So where to start? First is the rule book of your sanctioning body. All Speed insisted we provide them with all the various race events we may compete in, then the rules for each series and then they studied them in great detail. Rule #1, don’t pay for a cage that won’t pass the tech of the series you want to do.
Throughout the build All Speed had us out to the shop to verify everyone was on the same page. Installation height of the harness bar was a critical step and measured multiple times before welding to ensure the proper angle of the harness in comparison to my shoulder height.
