I apologize for the long time between updates but not much has happened – until now!
I’ve had a long and torturous path to getting the Lola caged. I won’t go into all of that here, some of it was out of my control, some of it was due to mistakes I made. However, we’re now on the right track.
This past week Jeff Lingle (SCCA Tech Chief for my area), Chris Schimmel (
Competition Cages - Quality Custom Race Cages and Roll Bars), Jeff Young, and I met about the Lola cage. The meeting went a few hours while the design of the cage hashed out and we went through the rules. The car will be placed in SCCA SPO. SPO stands for Special Production Over, the over being over 2.5L or any motor wearing forced induction. As of this writing SPO is allowed to run the VIR 13 Hour Enduro, as well as a few others in our area.
The cage will be constructed to 2008 GT specs that uses some of the wording that was published in the July 2007 FastTrack. Those rules are out now to be used on car construction, but they go into effect in January of 2008. They had a number of things that helped us out with this project including some removable rear hoop stays, bends in hoops, tube thickness changes depending on weight, and so on.
For example, 1.5” tubing size is now good for 2600 total weight, as opposed to 2200 lbs, on the weight threshold for predicted car total weight. This helped fit the structure in the car, especially in the area where the sills meet the low rear “firewall” and help comply with the cockpit rule issue below. Since we don’t know exactly what the car weighs we would have had to step up to the next size tubing which would have cut into some space. The front hoop would have not fit under the bodywork at the next size up, it just makes it at 1.5” with the bend radius and touches the bodywork and chassis. But it fits like it was made for it.
The good news is that the car can and will be SCCA legal. There was some question of that when looking at various things, but Jeff Lingle really likes the project and wants the car racing so he spent a lot of time to make this work out. But there are a few snags of course.
One issue we had was the cockpit. The cage rule states that the roll bar must go the full width of the cockpit and that is defined by the part of the car that makes the most intrusion into the driver area. And, this is the doors (yes we could remake the doors but driver needs the room). To get around this we’ll be moving the main hoop stay up further to the front of the car about 1.5” forward of where it is now. The hoop will then have a bend or jog in it down low to the outsides of the car, then it’ll come up and go through the top of the door thus meeting that requirement. This sounds ugly, and I didn’t like it. But it beats the alternative which is push the hoop back, widen it, and have it come right up through the rear clip about where the corner of the air intakes is located on the rear clip.
Side bars in the door area will be good and will be NASCAR style bars with pickets between the two. They will push out to the outsides of the sponsons but you won’t see any of that since it’ll be hidden by the door. The front low tube will fit extremely well under the fiberglass middle piece. The front area with tubing and pedals is being pulled out to accommodate the forward bar 100 sq in plates and then it can go back in, although there is less room. Should work, but the pedals will be tight now.
The downside of all of this the cage will not be removable. Even though it is a “bolt in” cage, once in the car and the tubes welded it physically can’t be removed without cutting the tubes. And, another downside in my opinion is the front down tubes to the low hoop are welded in place, not removable. I had to think long and hard about this as it essentially makes it sort of “sports racerish” and cuts down on the attractiveness of the car a little. But, I want to race it so it is a done deal. Chris will make the cage as attractive as possible for street use though and I think it’ll look reasonably well.
Fuel system was covered and we’re okay with a 25 gallon cell in the passenger compartment with proper bulkheads and isolation. Two fire systems tied together will be required for the car to get the log book, tech inspectors preference. He did not like the sponson fuel tanks and although he would pass if they had bladders, proper rollover stuff, correct necks, another bulkhead, and some other stuff, he felt that some regions would not pass them regardless. Tech is like that from place to place. The rules are written, but there is a lot of interpretation in the rules. So, the car will have two fuel systems, those tanks used for the street (the most dangerous place!) and the cell bolted in place for racing. I like the idea anyhow as I feel it is safer.
Harness bar will have locations for dual harnesses so the car can be used for street and track day instruction. Many clubs are killing open cars for track days without cages so it is a good thing to have the Lola with a cage. Track days are fun for getting some seat time and working out bugs and I’ll be pleased to have a car to use for that since my race car is not always welcome at track day events. And, naturally the knock ons are goners for racing and that hardware will have to be replaced.
All in all I’m extremely excited about the project and ready to get moving on it. I was concerned about caging the car for quite some time because until the Tech inspector says “go” you just don’t know what will happen. I feel the way we did this, getting the technical inspector involved from the get go, was a very good thing to do before time and money was invested to start on the project.
So, barring issues in a few weeks we’ll have the Lola back with the cage and we can really start building the car. Should be a lot of fun!