What happened to the Mulholland "King of the Hill" RSR?

[Banning]

Now we have a Coupe roof on an already stiffer Targa floor. The body feels very stiff at this point.

However to complete the job, a roll cage needs to be installed and tied into the body at several points. We shall do a 10 point for this project.

This will further stiffen the car allowing for the suspension to do it's job without body twist.

We start with cardboard patterns.

[Banning]

This cardboard piece forms the outer edges of the main roll bar hoop.



Ruben cut out and taped the parts together so he can learn how to make a roll cage.
I was busy installing factory Ram Air to a 1971 Mach I for a couple of days.



The main hoop will rest on the small ledges located just back of the door opening.



Here the main hoop will tie into the B Pillars with steel tabs.
You can see that the main hoop is almost vertical in the car.
This is for maximum strength just in case of roll-over.



Here is the pattern for the forward bars that link the main hoop to the A Pillars and forward floor.

[Banning]

At this point I wanted to verify the roof's final height.
The windows fit fine. Door window frames are slightly tight.

Measuring the height of the B Pillar on the passenger side to the bottom of the roof line, it is 12 3/4".



Closeup view.

[Banning]

The passenger side also measured in at 12 3/4" to the bottom of the roof line.
Nice that it's symmetrical.



Close up view.

[Banning]

During this project, some people asked me if I was going to "Chop" the roof.
Of course I said No Way! lol

However I went to my 1973 911T (that I know is unmolested) and compared factory heights.



It turns out that the factory height is 13" on both sides of the car.

So It appears that I have unknowingly "Chopped" the top by 1/4".
This happened because I didn't install the rear 1/4 sill plates before fitting the rear quarter glass.

I'm running without sill plates. We want to be as light as possible, and 1 or 2 grams might make all the difference. Just joking.
Who knows, maybe the car will look slightly sleeker being slightly chopped.

[ronin RS211]

Originally Posted by Banning

I am considering painting the "Targa" this color.

Nice choice..

[Banning]

Originally Posted by ronin RS211

Nice choice..

Yes, it seems the color gray suits most sports cars well.

With the addition of trim, special wheels, and something extra like a paint variation, gray can be quite striking.

[Banning]

Important to complete this roll cage so we can paint this puppy.
After looking around the Van Nuys area, I found a shop that does mandrel bending.

First it's important to know about how much tubing is required.
By using the cardboard patterns and a tape measure we can get the dimensions.



Main hoop is 98.5"
Back bars are 23" two required
Door opening bars are 51" two required
Front bars down are 20" two required
Front across top is 40"

A total of 346.5" or 28' 10 1/2"

Will be using 1 1/2" round steel tubing with a .120 wall

[Banning]

On monday I dropped off my patterns at Rodriguez Tube Bending in North Hollywood.
The next day tuesday, they were already cut and mandrel bent by noon.

As I walked into the old shop I could see the main hoop was laid out on the pattern.
It looks near perfect.



Here's Mr. Rodriguez with the forward tubes on the floor.



This is the machine that does the mandrel bending, that is, smooth radius curve bends.



Here is some of the other straight-cut pieces that will be needed to finish the job.



So after thanking Mr. Rodriguez for a job well done, I put the tubes in the back of the Camino and headed home.



If anyone's interested, he did all the labor and gave me all the steel for $300.00
Not a bad price for a quality Roll Cage Kit.

[Banning]

The metal was mega dirty and oily as it should be in a metal shop.
First thing to do was to clean off all the tubes with lacquer thinner.
What an improvement.



The main hoop and other tubes, ready to be sanded and primer applied.



Here are all the tubes together ready for paint prep.
One of the long tubes is for connecting the forward tubes together along the top of the windshield.

The one extra long tube is for the diagonal to be welded into the main hoop.
It was a last minute decision to add it but I believe it's worth it for strength.

[Banning]

As soon as this Roll Cage is complete, the car can be painted.
I plan to paint the Cage the same color as the interior/exterior.
No carpets, headliner, or rear panels. Only dash pad, door panels, and seats.

In order for the primer to stick to the tubing it has to be sanded first to give the surface "tooth". I used 220 grit to sand and clean the tubes.

You can see the left side of the main hoop has been sanded. It looks satin-like.
The right side looks like shiny metal.



Here is a close up view showing the small scratches the 220 grit sandpaper makes.
The primer covers completely, two coats needed.



The straight pieces I painted by holding one end and painting the other end.
Then reversing the process after the painted side was dry.
I used Rustoleum Automotive Primer in dark gray.

[Banning]

Here is the main hoop and long tubes primered and ready for assembly.



The rest of the required tubing, two coats of primer applied.
I found some pieces of 1/8, 3/16, and 1/4 inch plate for attachment plates.



A little warm to be outside doing this but I can't start putting the Cage together until it is primered.
Ruben has been a lot of help with the roof project but I will do most of this work. I'm kinda picky about my Roll Cages.
I intend to arc weld the main tubes together and MIG the attachment tabs to the body.



At some point this car is going to need an engine.
I have enough old parts laying around to assemble a 2.4S Motor.

I will expose some of the secrets of 911 horsepower by showcasing some special modifications you can do at home.
We will do a full porting job on the heads and drill for twin plug. That combined with the proper cams and compression...WOWEE! Ready for takeoff.

[Banning]

The first step in installing a Roll Cage is to fit and tack in the main hoop.
I checked the pattern against the main hoop tube and it was about 3 inches too long as requested.

You can see this in the photo.
At this point the hoop won't fit into the car as it is too tall.



The main hoop sits on the shoulders located behind the front seats in a 911 car.



I traced a line around the bottom of each leg of the main hoop using the pattern as a guide.
First however I checked the pattern to be sure it is the perfect size for the car height wise.

Then I estimated the angle of the shoulders in relation to horizontal and set the skill saw to 35 degrees.
By using the longest part of the cut as a guide I was able to get very close to correct size.



Other leg also cut to 35 degrees.

[Banning]

Now we can't just weld the tubing to the shoulder. Well... we could but it wouldn't be very trick.
So we need small plates that we can attach to the car that are also welded to the bottom of the legs of the tubing.



The shoulders have to be cleaned up slightly with a grinder so that the plates will sit flat.



Here is the driver's side bottom hoop plate in position.
I am temporarily holding it using sheet metal screws. They will be replaced with steel rivets later.



The passenger side also needed slight grinding for a flat surface.



Here is the passenger side plate ready for temporary fasteners.

[Banning]

The main hoop fits well in the car, just like the pattern did.
There was some small variation from the pattern that the bender did but it still worked nicely.



Using the MIG I tacked down the hoop to it's corresponding bottom plate.
This is the driver's side.



Same deal for passenger side.



Hoop now installed.
When the back bars are tacked in, I will remove the hoop and weld every connection securely.
Much easier out of the car, especially the top welds on the hoop.

Note how the main hoop closely follows the contours of the car. Four bends in the main hoop allow this.

[jmz]

Hey Chris,

This is all cool but I am curious, did you ever commit to doing a new version of your book? ...did I miss that?

Cheers,

JZ

[Banning]

Originally Posted by jmz

Hey Chris,

This is all cool but I am curious, did you ever commit to doing a new version of your book? ...did I miss that?

Cheers,

JZ

Hi Jay,
After having The Mulholland Experience edited properly about 3 years ago I decided not to reprint a second edition.
It didn't feel right to just re-hash the same 'ol material. I wanted something much better.

I re-designed another book that eliminates some of the chapters about Mulholland's accomplishments and my personal history.
Instead I added chapters on The Residents, Charley, Over The Hill, and some info on groups I missed in the first edition.
This new book has a new title and looks totally different with a lot more photos.

However before it can be printed and published, more information is needed to complete the story.
Also I am doing this alone this time so with all the distractions in life it is taking a lot more time to finish.

The Mulholland Experience was a learning experience for me. The book needed to edited professionally.
Every time I would make changes to fix mistakes, my co-author would go home and remove most of my corrections because he thought they were wrong. What a pain in the rear that was.

I was lined up to have Tim Considine do the editing but my co-author didn't want me to go that route. He wanted to stall and get more money out of me as a result and he did.
My mistake and poor judgment. We learn from our mistakes.

So I won't be printing until the new story is excellent and correct. Sorry but I cannot give a time estimate for it's completion yet.

Thanks for asking that question.
Regards from Mulholland, Chris Banning

[Banning]

Back bars are required to brace the main roll hoop to the rear firewall.
Metal plates are needed to fasten the tubes to the firewall.

Here are the 4 inch square plates temporarily fastened to the rear firewall.



Using the skill saw with the metal cutting blade I cut out the beginning of a bird mouth.
This allows one tube to go directly to another tube at 90 degrees.

[Banning]

I gave the Bosche metal grinder to Ruben to complete the bird mouthing of one end of each back bar. This is where the tubes connects to the main hoop.



After careful measuring, I cut the length of each back bar at the correct angle to meet the firewall in a flush manner.

[Banning]

After tacking in each back bar I let Ruben do a little more welding to insure no warping occurs during final welding with the arc.



Here are the back bars installed in the car.



The bars are parallel and symmetrical.
After the diagonal is welded in we can remove the roll bar and weld it up completely.
With some minor paint touch up around the welds it will be ready to re-install securely.