Vacuum Forming Splitter

[lateapex911]

I used to vacuum form parts for a design studio I worked in. A splitter is going to be tough in that you'lll need to heat a large sheet, which means a large oven or other heat source, and secondly, you'll need a pretty good vacuum and a nice big and flat frame to house the material. It's all probably cake with the right tools, but for us homebuilders, it's a tricky operation.

[Z3_GoCar]

Chip, I've decided to take your advice and mount brackets from the aluminum bumper bar to the splitter. The front is a slotted pin and the rear is a nylon bolt for a sheer element. The final peice will be slotting/clearancing my new finder liners where they normally mount to the bumper cover and under tray.



The pin is formed from a 1/4 bolt and a 3/8" pin with 1/4 washer on the outside, the rear hole is for a 1/4" nylon bolt while the wood block is to prevent the angle from stabbing a tire (I'm going to trim the excess bolt off.



The bracket from the bumper bar to engauge with the pin in the rear facing slot and the nylon bolt with the rear hole. I made these out of steel angle because it's easier for me to weld angle than to machine aluminum.



My splitter, ready to be sealed and painted. I decided to eliminate the center cut back and go with a straight planform as the car's not likely to get sucked down to bad with 8oolb front springs and just over 3" of ground clearance.

[Z3_GoCar]

So, I used my new splitter at Thuderhill, worked well on Friday, Saturday, and half of the race on Sunday. Then in the middle of the race on Sunday, I went off at the back side of the hill at turn 5. The right side sheared the 1/4"x20 bolt but the left side held and bent the angle bracket, but tore the plywood off the carrage head bolts, but there's no damage to the nose of the car. So I guess it worked as planned.

[Matt93SE]

:thumbsup: I think?

[Eagle7]

What was the material of the bolt that didn't shear?

[Z3_GoCar]

I've got nylon 1/4x20's but mounted it with regular grade steel bolts instead. The one that did sheer was also steel and I have the bracket from that too, and it looked like it was a clean sheer as designed.