Spent all day yesteday fitting my body work, its an aries chassis but the body work i've just built up over time, got scuttle, bonnet, nose cone all lined up nicely, went into the garage this moring to fit my roll cage and the front bars of it hit my scuttle panel and don't allow the cage to sit onto it mounting points.

I have another scuttle and it fits, this is due to the fact its 30mm lower (see pictures below, its the yellow one) also were it meets with the bonnet its at 90 degress to the chassis, were as the taller green one is at an angle (again in pictures below) does any one know were i can get a fibre glass bonnet and nose to match this scuttle, i dont want to go to aries as there stuff is pretty expensive, this car is only being built for a bit of cheap fun on the track and the odd hill climb.

Yellow scuttle measures approx - 260mm to the top of it in the centre.

Yellow scuttle measures approx - 290mm to the top of it in the centre.

Pic 1

Pic 2

Sorry about picture quality took them on the mobile, also appoligies had to link to pics as i tried to post the pictures but it didnt work for me.


Day off work sorta wasted now


[Edited on 14/12/09 by madrallysport]

I encountered the same issue with the ST cage. In the end I just persuaded the scuttle under the cage with brute force. It may not be possible with yours however?

Your best bet might be to use the scuttle and nose that you have and then make (or have made) and aluminium bonnet to suit. See below:

ETA: that's ridiculously small sorry - go to www.p4nts.co.uk/tlr instead.

[Edited on 14/12/09 by TimC]
Rescued attachment Side_small.jpg

i've tried the brute force and ignorance method, the green one just won't fit, the yellow one does just squeeze in, i think the body work i have got is for the like of a GTS panther, (looking on the web there now) i need a more orginal book type body work i think...

I never actually considered making an alu bonnet, to be honest i'd prefare a fibre glass one as i think i'd make a pigs ear of fabricating an alu one

[Edited on 14/12/09 by madrallysport]

Hi

Not all the book chassis are the same in the scuttle area. Best fit for a ST chassis is surprise surprise a St scuttle. If using another scuttle i also doubt that you will get a fiberglass bonnet to fit as the length dimensions will be all over the place as the chassis are all differing lengths in the engine bay also.

As TimC says Alloy bonnet may well be your only option.

Cheers Matt

Do what I did - find a local sheet metal fabricator in the yellow pages and go from there.

As I was not sure what I needed, I bought a Superscuttle from KineticVehicles in US, it comes in two pieces that I cut to desired width and pasted together, >I had to do radial cuts on the round portion, to alllow the scuttle to yield some, these cuts werre later reinforced from the back, the scuttle is a long way to be finished.
Based on this, you may want to remove a section in the middle, do some radial cuts to allow the scuttle to spring down and patch and finish.
HYH

Making a bonnet is seriously not that hard, and it will fit exactly. The job looks a lot more difficult than it really is. Yours may not be perfect, but I doubt the Lotus ones were either. In any case, nobody else will doubt that it was made by a factory. I made it LAST, after all the parts were on, except the dash screwed in.

I bought a fibreglass one, but it was out by 6" in length. It will all depend on where you mount your nosecone and scuttle, obviously, and this isn't always the same for everyone. For example, I wanted a shorter cockpit area, so my scuttle is moved back, and when combined with a nosecone that is mounted a bit forward, suddenly, no bonnet will fit, except the one made for that space.

So go ahead and make one. And be sure to post pics to the rest of us when you're done!

[Edited on 15/12/09 by RK]

[Edited on 15/12/09 by RK]