Steel is the better material IMHO

Whoa never seen that before... Btw I'll be in Tokyo next month and might be able to find some time on the Sunday to actually go and see/do stuff...
Any recommendations?

I've never been so I wouldn't know, but sounds like a great adventure! Protip: go to a breakers', purchase a set of Sportivo struts and tuck them away in your suitcase. They're really quite common and cheap in Japan!

Quote from: Snelbaard on August 11, 2019, 19:36On a side note I'm rather intrigued by this lower front brace, also made by Tom's Racing:



There are really very few pictures I can find of it, and none where it's mounted to a car. Does anyone here have this brace?

We bought the last one in the US almost 10 years ago, and still have it on the car.  It really does stiffen the front.  We hit a rather large deer some years ago which wiped out the radiator, radiator crossmember and much of the front bodywork, but when the chassis was put on a jig, it was still square, and the alignment was still correct.  The body shop attributed it to the brace.  It looks like part of it is missing as there is a crossmember that bolts to the side rails that would bolt to the bottom of the brace in the picture

I don't have any pictures of it mounted, but will see if I can get some pictures next time I have the car up on a lift

Lucky you! There was also one on Croooober a while ago but I missed out on it. You're right, there's a part missing in the picture above. I cropped that picture and the part just fell out of frame.
Pictures would be appreciated! I'm pretty sure I'll never find one of these so I might end up just fabricating something similar.

Tom's and Corky have also made this RLCB (Rear lower cross brace). To anyone in the know: does it make much of a difference? I fear that at some point you'll just be adding a fair bit of weight for diminishing marginal returns.

All these braces! Makes you think the basic car must be rubbish. 😜

Quote from: Snelbaard on August 23, 2019, 11:06I fear that at some point you'll just be adding a fair bit of weight for diminishing marginal returns.

Worse still, eliminating flex from the chassis reduces conformation with the road surface.
On a track where the surface is relatively smooth, that is not a draw back, on real world roads it is. So the returns are imo probably detrimental on the road.

Imho a road car needs as much compliance as possible while retaining directional stability. That is a compromise.
I prefer a bit wallowy car adhering to the road over a thight one loosing traction.
For this same reason the spring rate and damping for the road need be looked at with different needs in mind than track goodies.
I have a front strut brace, Dev´s door spacers and your belly brace. This I consider giving more feedback without costing too much conformation.
Any more I consider to be too much stiffness at the cost of adding weight.

Quote from: Petrus on August 24, 2019, 11:33

Quote from: Snelbaard on August 23, 2019, 11:06I fear that at some point you'll just be adding a fair bit of weight for diminishing marginal returns.

Worse still, eliminating flex from the chassis reduces conformation with the road surface.
On a track where the surface is relatively smooth, that is not a draw back, on real world roads it is. So the returns are imo probably detrimental on the road.

Imho a road car needs as much compliance as possible while retaining directional stability. That is a compromise.
I prefer a bit wallowy car adhering to the road over a thight one loosing traction.
For this same reason the spring rate and damping for the road need be looked at with different needs in mind than track goodies.
I have a front strut brace, Dev´s door spacers and your belly brace. This I consider giving more feedback without costing too much conformation.
Any more I consider to be too much stiffness at the cost of adding weight.

This +1

Once I make up my mind what I want to do with my suspension, these coilovers are coming off. I've removed a fair bit of flex out of the body. Now I need the suspension to match for daily driving.

Quote from: shnazzle on August 24, 2019, 14:50Once I make up my mind what I want to do with my suspension, these coilovers are coming off. I've removed a fair bit of flex out of the body. Now I need the suspension to match for daily driving.

With my lightend car, the springs could be shortened a little, going to júst under OEM static hight, nut maintaining the OEM dynamic ride hight becasue shortening the springs in effect makes them stiffer if even so little. Carolyn pointed me to some insightful info about the latter.

Also the lower unsprung as well as sprung weight could do with less damping, resulting in the OEM damping being relatively that much ´harder´ while remaining the same in respect to the springs.

The stiffened tub/chassis gives more responsiveness, the compliant suspension conforms with the road surfac.

The combination results in a more responsive yet very well conforming car. Wáy too soft for the track, gréat for B-roads.

You're really going to be hard pressed to tell mine apart from the original once it's coated

Well done!

In two words:
Im pressive.

Seriously; faultless remakes.

Thanks guys, it's really a pleasure to see it all coming together. These are now done, today I also bent the tubes for the main brace.

Good stuff! Please let me know costs etc when ready.

Will do! When everything's ready I'll make a dedicated thread with all the relevant information.

I wonder: Would there be any demand for front under braces? I have a TRD one and could easily make similar braces, only improved of course. Would people here be interested in those?

I'm talking about braces similar to these:

I'd be interested as long it was compatible with the TTE style brace.. which I'm sure it would be!

To be honest I can't answer that with absolute certainty, as I haven't yet been able to find a picture of a car sporting both a TRD front brace and a TTE/Matt's midbrace. But if a TTE style brace can be combined with a TRD front brace, it can be combined with mine as well. And I'm pretty sure they can be.

[EDIT: scratch all of the above, someone on Spyderchat has been able to combine the two, so there should be no problems at all]

Quote from: Snelbaard on October  9, 2019, 16:28To be honest I can't answer that with absolute certainty, as I haven't yet been able to find a picture of a car sporting both a TRD front brace and a TTE/Matt's midbrace. But if a TTE style brace can be combined with a TRD front brace, it can be combined with mine as well. And I'm pretty sure they can be.

I have both.  The front brace had to be modified to work with the TTE. 
the lugs at the side had to be cut off and re-welded.

Ah I see, that's a shame. Do you by any chance have a picture of this? That way I could possibly make my braces such that no modification is needed.

You would need to include a spacer to take up the space occupied by the TTE brace, for those who don't have one.

I'll be making a small run of TTE type braces btw.

Oh I see. Do you know the thickness of the bit of angle iron of the TTE brace mounting brackets?

Quote from: Snelbaard on October  9, 2019, 16:47Oh I see. Do you know the thickness of the bit of angle iron of the TTE brace mounting brackets?

I'll measure when I next have her on the lift.

I'm very happy with my MegillianMotorsport ones...