Safety Device Rollbars ... Advices please!

[Old English White]

Hi ...
Back from Donington and the TTR shop , I manage to give me some "home work"...
Before starting the torture , I ask you , the "racers" , what are your tips for the fitting of a complete rollbar from Safety Device in a Coup? Elan ...
Appart having the seats and steering wheel removed , I wonder about the order of each operations , if the car should be lifted , if some traction should be necessary , etc ... from your experience .
Next time , it will be on manifold and exhaust system ...
Christian.

[GrUmPyBoDgEr]

Hi,
if you buy your "Safety devices" roll bar from TTR you will find him most useful & he wiil give you all the information needed to install. I believe that the roll bars are made by "S-D" using his tooling.

[Old English White]

... Yes , D.J. , you are right ... but I was asking for YOUR experience , specially on Coup? ... not for help me to read the "customer instruction sheet"; I am waiting for , you know , these details you always discover during having difficulties .
Don't be afraid not to post a reply ,I will understand that 's easy or that I am the first of us !
Christian.

[GrUmPyBoDgEr]

Hi Christian,
sorry to have missed you at Donington. My only experience is fitting an S.D. roll bar to my S4 none coupe. I decided not to fit the side intrusion bars. For that, the rear wheels must be off & maybe the rear suspension slightly dismantled in order to thread the bars along the sill interiors. In any case the interior side trim panels and carpets have to come out. Attachment points are the body to chassis bolts. Assuming you are building a pure racer,the interior of the car will be bare of all trim in any case. Getting the roll bar itself into position will be the most difficult job in the coupe. It will have to go in & out a few times until you have fettled the floor mounting holes to suit your chassis bolts. I needed spacers between the rear stays & the chassis mounting points in my S4. (All these cars are a bit different dimensionally) The fitting of the remainder should be comparitively easy. Be prepared to do a fair bit of filing etc. it's not just an afternoon job.
excuse any spelling mistakes, I've got a cold!
John

[SADLOTUS]

Hi Old English,
I also put an SD roll bar into my S4 - DHC - one tip which may or may not be helpful was to put studs into the rear suspension turrets instead of bolts, I found it very difficult to get the bolts to go in here.
I also had to use a spacer, 2-2.5x4 cm aluminium rod - easy to cut and adjust and doesn't weigh anything.
The holes i cut in the rear inner wheelarch ended up bigger than i'd thought they were going to be.
Also had a tight fit problem with the steel zigzag bracing in the (B?) pillar behind the seats.
Lots of loose fitting and jiggling around until things fit then do up tight. Good luck... you'll work up a sweat!

[rgh0]

Old English

Do you know positively that the SD bar fits in the coupe. I custom made a bar for my coupe and it needed some careful custom fitting to get it to fit just in front of the top of the rear window behind my head and hard up against the roof so it was level with my head which also just touches the roof with a helmet on.

To fit the bar I need to remove the seats. The bar then slides in through the door with the top tilted forward at about a 45 degree angle. Once in the car you rotate the bar top backwards and slide the bar back inside the car to its mounting points. I suspect the SD bar would need to be similarly fitted.

Rohan

[Old English White]

... Waooooowww!
One day off -I was with a friend and his Europa Twincam at Croix-en-Ternois , small circuit-club in the north of France for the presentation of the new Exige S - and I get it all !
Thanks for your reply, I can appreciate the real utility of this forum ...
D.J. (sorry for Donington !), I am not building a "pure racer" : I will never convert "Old English White" in a 26R "replica" but , I will do all the necessary for its (and my) security (rollbar!), handling(susp. steering and brakes) and fiability (rad & fan , alternator )with style (Minilite's & stripes ,exhaust)... performances (engine & gear) will have to wait ! Anyway , the "pure racer" , I can't afford it , and even just doing this start to cost a lot !
So , Rohan & Sadlotus , You had the same experience of putting a rollbar in a Coup? . I will try to intall mine with the side bars (the main reason is "OEW" is rhd in a lhd country!), so is it better to fit tight the main bar first then intall the rest -side and front cage- or , as Sadlotus wrote , put everythings in , then tighten all the different part at the same time ? Your opinion? Serious things start on saturday ...!
Christian.

[patrics]

Hi Christian,
I have also brought a cage from TTR but only rear and side bars. The side bars need cutting to fit which sounds easy but in practice its not because they need to fit in two planes and its difficult to measure accurately. I am sure the bars are long enough to fit a plus 2.
Fortunately or other wise depending how you look at it I am also replacing all of side frames which made it a lot easier. But if I was doing it normally I think it would be easier to cut holes in both front and rear arches and then feed the side bar through bolt it up then mark and cut to length.
Regards
Steve

[Old English White]

... I started with the rollbar this morning...
Seats , steering wheel & gear lever off ; 20mn . 10mn later , the mains bar was in position ; Rohan you were right about the way to get it in !
But quickly I & my friend Gilles (another Elan S3 owner -reader of Elan.net but not posting!)were stopped by screws & nuts ! they are simply to short to go throug the chassis ,the bobin , the plate and allow the nylstop nut to be tighten ; they must be at least one third longer ! I have one question ; are they different size of bobin depending location or model & years if not, I will ask TTR for explanations .
In another way , never forget about the screw near the shock location ... On my car , they were replaced by the fixation of period harnesse and if they go straightforward in the location on the bar , I have nothing for fixing the bar !
Today I decide to stop and on monday I will get new scews , can't wait for TTR reaction , don't want to loose another week-end , must be at Le Mans-Bugatti in May ... and the rollbar is very important to me and not the only part I have to get fixed.
In the same order , just wondering about the best way to squeez the TTR manifold. all athe same time from under or ...?(I have the "aerotech" nuts for this...)
Christian

[Dag-Henning]

Christian ! You need to have the modified front left chassis-leg to fit the TTR manifold. If you have, dismount all the manifold studs from the head, as you need to use bolts instead. (!) No way to get the flanges over the studs....- tight !

Dag

[Old English White]

... Hi Dag!
So happy to see than you accept to dicuss with me after that I made to you !(see "tape it !" post , for the others...)
Seems than nothing goes straightforward on Elan's ... So, You write no way to have this TTR manifold on the car without cutting a part of the chassis . But can you put a picture of this area (it don't need to be artistic , I just want to figure me the difficulties) in the gallery , or contact me by MP , I will give you my Email.
Christian.

[Dag-Henning]

Hi Christian, - I have sent you a pm. Will pass you some pictures.......

Dag

[steveww]

I have some good pictures of a modified chasis that I will post up tomorrow. I am not at home at the moment so do not have access to them. Just to confirm you will not fit the TTR manifold with out cutting the chasis.

I was going to fit one to my Elan but I have run out of time as there are still a few more jobs to finish and I want the car back on the road soon. Good luck with your deadline for Le Mans

[Old English White]

... Steve ,
No more hurry , Dag send me some pictures with all the details ... I just wonder about the differences between a TTR 26R chassis and the Lotus Elan 66' chassis ... I already notice number of them arround the "towers" and near the rear A-arms locations , so what about this area.(if your picts are on a "standard" chassis , I will wait for them!)
For the rollbar I already have souced new screws (the ones near at the belt area !) and tomorrow I will have the rest ... I just pray for no other surprise .
You will know about my rendez-vous !
Christian.

[steveww]

Here are some pictures of the TTR chasis showing the cut out for the big exhaust manifold. Note: You need to radius the corners and strengthen this part of the chasis or it will crack.