Outer Limits 4x4 Board

nearly finished building a 6point internal cage for my sierra.
I'm interested in fitting a harness, and have built a harness bar just under shoulder height of the seats.
I'd like to retain the sierra seats (cant be bothered with racing type seats).

but should my harness go over the harness bar?

My seats are mounted to the floor of the vehicle.
What issues are there with mounting the harness? I'm worried that if my seats mount to the floor, it could be dangerous to mount the harness to the cage, or mount upper harness to cage, lower points to floor etc.

IE do all points go to floor, upper points go over the harness bar?
Is it safe to mount to the floor? Any reinforcing required?

how have others done this? (callin Bru21! )

you might want to have a talk to an engineer first if your getting it engineered.

DIRTY ROCK STAR wrote:you might want to have a talk to an engineer first if your getting it engineered.

Understand. But not going down that road.

Just want to mount the harness in the best/safest way possible, given my setup... (Cage is not tied to chassis. Seats are not mounted to cage.)

Not sure i'd be keen on running harness through head rest... but in terms of anchor points, the rear seat has "rated" seat belt mounts in the tray... a little off centre but workable.

Might be worth dropping in to KCF (kippa ring?) motorsports and talkin to em if you live up that way. Or you could hit the CAMS website and see what they tend to require as guidance.

Spock

dee, most people run seats mounted to the floor and i believe its still iffy in queensland to mount seats to the internal cage (because dot are stupid sometimes) so seats and cage mounted to floor is prolly the only legal way to do it.

as for harness, run a bar where the harness needs to be to go over your shoulders in the correct position and anchor it to the cage or floor, your choice.

Say you have a smash or a roll over, besides the headrest, is there anything to stop the shoulder straps slipping off?

Or are you only interested in harnesses for the cool factor?

Gonzo wrote:Say you have a smash or a roll over, besides the headrest, is there anything to stop the shoulder straps slipping off?

Or are you only interested in harnesses for the cool factor?

only want the harness to stop me putting my head into the cage in a rollover. couldn't give 2 shits about coolness...

Not an expert on this one but my thoughts would be that connect the harness to either the body or the floor, but not both. This is if there is an impact the points will stay together rather than be separated on impact.
Also if you are mounting the belts to the floor make sure you have a shoulder height bar to support the strain so that you don't get compressed in an impact.
Last bit try to keep the belts as short as possible as they can stretch around 10% or more.

Dee wrote:

Gonzo wrote:Say you have a smash or a roll over, besides the headrest, is there anything to stop the shoulder straps slipping off?

Or are you only interested in harnesses for the cool factor?

only want the harness to stop me putting my head into the cage in a rollover. couldn't give 2 shits about coolness...

In that case, running harnesses in seats not designed for it isn't really safe.

You'll note on seats designed for them, the strap runs through reinforced holes in the seat.


In the event of a roll over, my shoulder straps will stay on my shoulders.
If you're running stock seats, there would be a high risk of the shoulder straps coming off. A standard seatbelt would be safer.

I cant find my CAM motorsport manual, though I'm pretty sure they also states that you shouldn't have the mounting points which at the rear of the seat at a level which is below where it passes through the seat as this can lead to seat failure in a crash.

Slunnie..

not sure about the level, i think it's more to do with the angle....

i also don't have the manual handy to check... and net is way to slow to check it online here.

Spock

Slunnie wrote:I cant find my CAM motorsport manual, though I'm pretty sure they also states that you shouldn't have the mounting points which at the rear of the seat at a level which is below where it passes through the seat as this can lead to seat failure in a crash.

If you're referring to my pic, the bit of strap hanging down (just right of the scope) is the loose end. My mounting points are nice and high almost level with the seat holes.

I was thinking of something along the lines of Rhetts setup

Running sierra seats with an 'im not sure what type of' harness.

Didn't want to go to the effort of racing seat. Its going to be hard enough to get in & out with a harness & cage as it is. Plus im not doing any 'high speed' sort of stuff.
I just want the harness to hold me down tight in my seat in the event of a rollover , rather than risk flopping about with a stock seatbelt & hitting my head on the cage or falling through the roof of the cage!

I thaught the harnesses had to go over the sholder bar then to the seats.???
but I have been known to make mistakes b4

it has to be on no more then 12 degrees line above the seat and no more than 20 degrees or something below the shoulder seat line.

ive used harnesses in a normal seat and they worked fine. didnt slide off or anything and that was doing winch challenge. just make a guide for it on the shoulder bar to make it sit over your shoulder as good as possible

Your question is can the harness mount to the cage or do they have to go to the body.

My question is how is your cage mounted, body only or through to the chassis? If it's body only then mount the harness directly to the harness bar. I know what you are trying to achieve and I am doing the same. Just use the buckle in the harness and loop the harness around the bar, don't bother with welding on tabs to the cage to bolt to as this just adds another point of failure.

Are you getting the cage approved. If so this will more then be adaquate to do the harness job. Are you leaving the original seat belts in there for on road use and harnesses for offroad only.

just cruizin' wrote:Your question is can the harness mount to the cage or do they have to go to the body.

My question is how is your cage mounted, body only or through to the chassis? If it's body only then mount the harness directly to the harness bar. I know what you are trying to achieve and I am doing the same. Just use the buckle in the harness and loop the harness around the bar, don't bother with welding on tabs to the cage to bolt to as this just adds another point of failure.

Are you getting the cage approved. If so this will more then be adaquate to do the harness job. Are you leaving the original seat belts in there for on road use and harnesses for offroad only.

sorry, thought i mentioned in my first post that im not going to tie cage to chassis, body only.

Not getting approved, but still aiming to build to a proper standard/ do it the right way. Yeah i'm leaving seatbelts in.
Are you having yours approved? Are they happy enough with looping the strap around the harness bar?

thanks mate, that answered my Q's.

My harnesses loop onto the shoulder bar only, no connections for eyebolts at all, and have a SFI approoval.

What is the risk involved in mounting the belts to separate parts (i.e. chassis vs. body vs. seats vs. cage etc). Is it the risk of the straps tightening and crushing the occupant in the event of a major crash (a crash in which body/cage/seats/chassis may separate)? Or have i been reading this thread wrong from the beginning...

-Stu

I think that's the issue but it won't come into play anyways with our style our driving is SE Qld unless Dee gets into speed events where the cage will need approval. For crawlin around GH, Cruiser and the like looping the shoulder bar will be fine.

Dee, I am getting my cage approved but not the harness as the factory belts will be in place for on road use. I know a couple of guys that race that just loop the bar.

my cage is mounted over 10 spots the the body..i've mounted my seats to the cage and my harnesses to the cage also.. i figure that way if i do have a bad acco or rollover i'm tied into my cage.. doesn't matter if body comes away from chassis or cage.. i also mounted my harnesses straight to the taxi bar behind the seats.. by looping around bar and using the adjuster thing as a buckle.. if you follow what i'm saying.

i figure that the cage is the strongest thing in the whole car.. so i may as well be tied to it..

dogbreath_48 wrote: Is it the risk of the straps tightening and crushing the occupant in the event of a major crash (a crash in which body/cage/seats/chassis may separate)?
-Stu

Yeah that's what I'm thinking too.

Pinball wrote:Slunnie..

not sure about the level, i think it's more to do with the angle....

i also don't have the manual handy to check... and net is way to slow to check it online here.

Spock

same boat, but I'm too short on time to search properly. I also vaguely remember a thread on it floating around here too.

If the angle is too high your shoulders will be torn apart, If the angle is too low you may as well not be wearing a harness or something to that effect was the reasoning. It is definately worth skimming over the cams specs for harness mounting.