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Seat Belt Upper Anchorages
Dick Axtell - 12/6/02 at 09:35 AM

All -

Got the SVA manual, got the necessary dimensions for upper mounts (anchorages).

It will probably be necessary to weld a cross-tube to the roll-over bar, in order to meet the 450mm requirement. In this case, can the r/o bar be bolted to the chassis, or must it be welded?

Advice urgently sought, as this step is critical (particularly re rear ally panelling)!

TIA
Dick


David Jenkins - 12/6/02 at 09:48 AM

The book doesn't say that it should be welded - but it does leave a lot to the tester's own judgement, unfortunately. It says something along the lines of "the mounting points must be fixed to a strong bit of the chassis, preferably triangulated" - my words, but I think it's a fair summary.

My roll-over bar uses four 8mm HT bolts at each end, and has hefty stays going down to the rear corners of the chassis where they are each fixed with two 10mm HT bolts. I have reinforced the square tube where the 8mm bolts go through, using drilled steel bar to prevent the tube being crushed. The seatbelt mountings are welded through a cross bar of the same diameter as the main roll bar. If I hit anything hard enough to tear this off, I'll be in deep sh*t anyway!

I suspect that they wouldn't be happy with a roll-over bar that wasn't braced strongly in some way (more than 2 thin tubes down to the top rear tube of the boot space).

cheers,

David


Dick Axtell - 12/6/02 at 01:50 PM

Thanks for the feedback, David. Sounds like common sense, to stay the roll-over bar.

Dick