fire wall alterations.

[able]

i need to cut into my fire wall and a few friends have had different opinions on its legalities....

the part i need to modify is the rounded edge near the bottom left corner of the heater.

i need about a few inches to fit in my vk manifold.

hang on... its easier with a pic...

and thanks to the magic of television...



right.... ok.

so now that you know exactly what i need to cut out and remembering that im a Victorian... is it legal for me to just cut that section out and plate it flat or as one friend suggested cut out triangles and push the area into the shape i want and weld it up? (he seemed to think i need the original fire wall metal for it to be legal..... )

i was thinking of just going down to the place where i will be eventually going for the roadworthy and seeing what he will pass... i suppose its up to him in the end? 

[ben]

yeh id suggest ring a few roadworthy blokes first.. see what they think.

[Jason 253 CF]

Um that looks like a bit too much cutting to be acceptable you most likely have to get it engineered to even have a chance getting it roadied

[rossie]

Able it would pay to talk to a engineer and stick to the same engineer when you get the certificate, we use three difffrent ones for work and they do differ

[able]

my rego fella is still not open but i was thinking that maybe i could cut and move the passenger side of the engine tunnel over two or three inches and then re-weld it and make it look factory.

if i do a good job it will just look like the passenger fire wall is slightly smaller then the drivers side.


is this plausible? has anyone else done this?

i have had a look and their is nothing under the floor pan so i would just be cutting and moving the lip and curve over and i will just have to fit a slimmer heater of turn the original on its side.

[Warren]

Able

Sounds like a good idea, if you do it well no one will notice, and I dont think it would make that much difference structurally.

Warren

[eddy]

or ..... put a normal manifold and carby on and passed rego then do the alteration ..... woops forget I said that 

[BusyKiwi]

NZ has different rules to you guys but you can argue the bit you want to remove (idealy turn inside out) has no strength in it, sure it's the lower part of the firewall but it does not attach directly to the chassis (which isn't a chassis but a stiffner), the little plate viewed in the bottom right of the photo is the joiner (even though not a direct join to stiffner).

When you put a bigger engine in, you increase the floor area, this section is really the corner of the floor - not a structural bit like where the bonnet hinges bolt to

[Marishka]

make sure u keep the piece in case it dont pass ,
then u can just weld it back in,