Thread: Seat & Seat Belt Mounts

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Evidence of my being uncomfortable with the fender washer approach, which had been suggested to me by a local guy, is me asking the question here. Regs, I share your concern about the forces involved and the strength of the floor, even with Core-Mat. IC2, I understand your "sandwich" approach and it sounds secure, but applying it to my glass body is a bit different. CCBob, your comment is one that really makes us think - this is a fiberglass car, so any crash of significance is going to put us in a world of hurt. Recall KennyD's pictures a few days back of the Willy's that broke up all around him. Tech, as usual you cut to the chase with specifics, which I expect are based on your understanding of the rule books for comp cars. While the body may be separating from the chassis in a wreck, your approach is to ensure that the part with the seats remains a unit, which makes sense to me.
I attached a picture from N&N's website showing the basic chassis - American Stamping rails with a round tube bracing section between, sort of a modified X-member with upper & lower sections. The upper section is at, or very close to contacting the bottom of the body - within 3/16" at the widest point in the area of the seats. Tomorrow I will spend some time laying under the car pondering the layout, and how best to anchor the seat bolts while keeping it presentable. The body is coming off very soon for final frame work, prep and paint, so the timing is not too bad.
Thanks to all who took time to respond.

I will agree with techinspector1 in asmuch the seatbelt should be mounted correctly for not only safety but also comfort. I find it difficult to understand why some people believe that in a crash, the body will seperate from the frame... If constructed correctly no car should fall apart like that... When building my Bucket I constructed a special crossmember with outriggers solely to mount seatbelts that when the body is fitted the seatbelt bolts pass through the floor into the crossmember mounts. The should height seatbelt mounts are welded into the heavy 3mm wall rollbar that is bolted directly to the chassis/frame. I personally find that the seatbelts in my bucket are far more comfortable than the stock belts in my BMW coupe, as they don't slide up my shoulder and cut into my neck.. As tech says..... use heaps of bolts / fasteners to attach that body....

This thread has made me look closer at the whole body/seat/seat belt mounting from a system approach rather than as individual components, which is the right thing to do. I will probably have more work to do than I had anticipated when I pull the body from the frame, but it will hopefully result in a safer overall approach.