Roll Cage

[dkn1997]

I was looking at Vain's post with  his charger update and it made me start thinking...always dangerous, I know. 

But has anyone ever tried to install an almost invisible roll cage?  real tight to the outside of the car, hidden behind the trim, etc...?  I am not planning on doing a cage in my car, but always wondered if it was possible to really hide one so that you would have to be looking to see it. 

[Mike DC]

It can be done very well if you're willing to put the work into it & cut the car as necessary.  The physical size of 1.75" tubing isn't that much of a visual intrusion on the lines of the interior roof, you just have to be willing to really build the cage with the issue in mind.  It's probably best left to someone who's willing to hand-bend their own rollcage though.  The billed man-hours from a shop would probably come out pretty ugly. 

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Look at Mark Stielow's silver "Mule" Camaro that they did all those PHR articles on a couple years ago.  The cage bars were REALLY tight against the front half of the roof.   It's do-able if you're willing to really cut/modify/abolish the dashboard frame & interior trim in the areas of the tubing.

The "Mule" car also showed the interesting trick of laying the B-pillar main hoop back at a slight angle so that it lined up behind the side window's meeting point, rather than having the tube straight vertical.  I dunno whether that's NHRA-legal or not.  But I'm sure it helped hide the appearance of the bars whenever any of the side windows were still rolled up.

The '69 Chargers in the 2005 DOH movie had the backseat upper/roof bars tucked so far out of the way that you couldn't see them until they can down behind the back window glass.  The movie cars had the bars placed down through existing holes in the rear shelf, but if you cut the sheetmetal & pushed those bars a couple inches farther outward then they wouldn't show at all.

[moparguy01]

from the outside of my 74 you cant tell theres a rollbar in it, i have it tilted back to somewhat follow the lines of the back of the door glass. but i have to modify my door bars, since i had knee surgery its somewhat difficult to get in and out of.