[ Closed ] Firewall question (Page 1 of 2)

In a T-bone, couldn't you be cooked by your choice of method: grilled or steamed?

Yes indeed we have been having that grilled/steamed conversation thus why we are asking some outsiders as to other posesible firewall ideas.

We sure hope we are going to be getting in for the Lamest Day @ Nelson race since it is the closest to us (less then an hour away). We ran last year at Toledo (2 Slow Racing: Flying Brick)

Our car was a rust bucket before, and took a bit more of a beating then we thought after the race was done. Gas tank needed relocated cause it honestly almost fell out last year after somebody gave us a love tap directly into the tank. This years mounting location and bracketry is much improved.
We are also trying to make a couple cage improvements mainly because the rear unibody was/is starting to fail.
As for in the main cabin area we are only planning on mounting the battery in passanger seat. We have a 2" EMT tube running as a firewall tube for the fuel, brake, and electrical to the back. And there is another 2" EMT that has out water lines running thru it that will also pass thru cabin (figured we should double wall that as we don't want to be sprayed with hot coolent if something does go bad)

I don't know, that looks a little scary to me. I mean, the fuel cell is next to the driver, the radiator is in back of the driver, and is that the exhaust system over the fuel cell? The way it is currently configured, I doubt it will pass any sort of inspection.

What kind of a vehicle is this thing anyway? I have witnessed a lot of radiator relocations lately,  and it never seems to work out in the end (except for Nick's craptastic Alfa!)

Here's what we did with our fuel cell....

I have no worries about overheating with this radiator and an electric fan. Honestly its so oversized in a front mount position it would never even require a fan, if anything cardboard to restrict flow.
The setup isn't for everyone, we feel it will work out much better for us and honestly believe our car will be safer then last year (of which we had zero issues going thru tech).
The fun part about the Lemons race is we can try some goofy and interesting things with the car.
The car started its life as a '86 325es. As you can see we have been abusing it for a while

Why exactly are you moving the radiator in the first place? We've run a 325 E with the radiator in the stock position for 5 races including 2 of the Altamont demo-derbys with no issues.

Team Formula BMW
Finishing order: 44th, 44th, 19th, 10th, 5th, 10th, 5th
We will win some day

Kinda what I was wonderign as well.  We ran a 325e too at CMP (twice) and it never overheated.

Just because we thought it would be fun. We also have had zero issues with the radiator in the front mount location. Also we figured we are locating some more weight in the center of the car for better handling.
The hoses and such for radiator shall be in rearward position so if they do pop it will at least be directed initially away from driver.

As I read the rules as I don't have a roof behind the rollcage hoop I don't really see that as the cabin anymore. The fuel cell is just a Summit aluminum one with safety foam installed.
I guess that is the root of the issue, what type of walls must I build to make sure it is not longer part of the "cabin"

I'm not interesting in changing how things are working, just wanna make sure it makes the tech guys happy.

Way back when I was involved with building a Lemons car, we were focused on making it stay alive in the bash-n-crash environment of Altamont, so a rear radiator seemed like a fine idea. It was actually a lot of fun rigging up a big ol' truck radiator and some BMW 7 series cooling fans in the back, with Toyota MR2 side scoops on the doors and a big duct coming out of the trunk... but it didn't work. We had a hurricane of air blowing out the back, we fixed all the leaks in the steel piping going from the radiator to the engine, we bled the hell out of the system to solve the air-bubble problem, and we tried a half-dozen junkyard water pumps in hopes of finding one that flowed better than the others, but the car still overheated like crazy when we took it to a Volvo track day at Thunderhill. Was the problem caused by airflow weirdness at speed? Crappy Ford water pumps that couldn't move water 10' and back, plus a 12" elevation change? Cosmic rays? So, with less than a week to go before the race, we put a Mercedes 450SEL radiator in front (tip: excellent junkyard radiator, very easy to find and cheap during Half Price Weekend sales).

Not saying your setup won't work, because I can think of several Lemons cars with rear-mounted radiator conversions that worked fine (and a few more that didn't work), but you should be doing it entirely because it's fun to solve such engineering challenges on a shoestring budget and not for demolition-derby-style invulnerability.

Yes we are doing it for engineering challenge factor. We like the fact that we will now have crush room just in case someone loses control and smashes into us. We found Toledo 08 to be very civil but we still did get some hits. With our solution we have a good couple feet of crush in the rear and about 1ft of crush in the front. We aren't planning on hitting anybody or anything, but we know sh*t happens so its a nice side benifit.

So now that we are clear on its a stupid idea but we accept this will our firewall plans be acceptable? I should hopefully have some pictures of that once we get to it in next week or so. Still have other more pressing engineering issues to work on before we tackle the firewalls.

Unless they T-bone you behind the door, then its flamed or steamed

Okay will do that ASAP. Thanks.