ChumpCar Update - The Teardown Continues

Welcome back boys and girls. It's time (or perhaps past time) for an update on the ChumpCar project. The team got together last weekend with the goal of installing the cage and making further progress on the teardown. At least past of this was accomplished.


We continued to strip the insulation from the interior. All the insulation must be removed per the rules (I believe), which makes sense since its flammable (Inflammable means flammable! -- What a Country!!" - Dr. Nick). We had an air chisel this time which made much quicker work of the remaining insulation.


Then we started getting the cage in to see how it fit. We are using an Autopower 6-point bolt-in roll cage. Obviously we will be adding some SFI padding later to protect the driver. We will also need to reposition the headlight switch as the cage is directly in its way.

The biggest issue we tried to figure out was the fact that the drivers on the team are very different sizes yet we all need to fit in the car and be able to see over the dash, but the tall drivers also must be at least 2 inches below the top of the cage. In order to make it so that the shorter drivers (See, me) be positioned to see over the dash yet keep the taller drivers below the cage we had to remove the sunroof cassette

In the old E3os the sunroof cassette (which has all the mechanics of the sunroof) are held into the roof with metal brackets and then glued in for additional strength. Our soultion: Cut the Damn thing OUT!!! Wish I had more pics of cutting the sunroof out of the roof from inside the care, but honestly I spent a good bit of the time with the grinder cutting it out, so was unable to multi-task. Eventually we also had to cut the sunroof out from above (see top pic)


After that we did some further trimming to get the cage up as high as possible. We finally got it so that I can see over the dash and the taller drivers will meet the clearance requirements.


Looks like we will need to do some welding to get the cage where we want it and I hope to bring that to you next time. We also need to get the seat brackets and slider fabricated. The seat will need to move so that I can reach the pedals and the taller drivers wont be squished against the wheel. They challenges of team endurance racing...

Still a lot of work to do before the first race in June. We will also be raising money for charity so stay posted for updates on that as well.