Since I've been cooped up in composites-land for the past few weeks, I hadn't really seen direct evidence of how well frame production is running. Crappy weather over the past few days created a backlog of cars to be ground. Grinding outside keeps our shop cleaner and makes the chassis much easier to see.
Anyways, it's nice to see a couple cars lined up all at once:
Hats off to our Georgia Tech Co-Op Tyler for managing and greatly speeding-up the process. The man loves his sub-assembly jigs.
Grinding outside makes my driveway turn orange in the next morning's dew!
They're in Georgia. They'll just pretend it's clay.
Doesn't look like mine is in that line. I got double diagonals .
mrvwcastner wrote: Doesn't look like mine is in that line. I got double diagonals .
I think you'll want us to spend more than two working hours between "on deck" and "done, in a picture." 
We'll be doing another production station rotation tomorrow morning, which is when your top half will be built. If it helps, the weld quality is better than ever! I need to bring in a macro lens tomorrow, because these MIG wizards we recently brought in are amazing.
See those sheets hanging up to the left of the Lincoln Electric banner? Those are our build order sheets "on deck", and yours is the one on the top.
AWESOME!. Not that i'm excited or anything
I think the welded floors & double diagonals will really make me feel secure.
Well the whole design looks a damn site safer than a Sevenesque. That's for sure.
Just finished this car. The customer asked for us to leave out a few key welds for a particularly stoopid engine swap. Also pictured is yet another XP-3 clone that we picked up from powder. XP-3 itself is behind that frame, too. That Neon Green sure is popular.
kreb wrote: Well the whole design looks a damn site safer than a Sevenesque. That's for sure.
Maybe:
Maybe not:
The first hit a truck and flipped it, the second hit a curb. It's hard to compare since the exocet is a totally different design, different types of accidents, likely different speeds, etc but curved tubes can do odd things in a wreck.
In reply to bgkast:
The bottom car is not an Exocet, it is an Atom and it did a lot more than hitting a curb
Lemme tread lightly: I don't believe that particular failure mode is as much of a concern with the American Exocet frame.
Our floor is very much a "stressed member" and takes bending, torsional, and impact loads. In a simplified explanation, the height of the structure corresponds to strength and stiffness in more than a linear manner, even more than tubing thickness. Even the A-frame in the firewall is designed to articulate and help push the engine down and away from the passenger compartment in a frontal impact. In the Atom, the passenger compartment is a composite tub that hangs from the frame. The cars diverge in design goals, and it's one of the big reasons why our car is 100 lbs heavier despite a similar footprint and structure.
The Atom's frame puts most of its loads through two swept tubes and a couple sharp cantilevered joints. Our sweeps are sturdy 0.083" wall, and our cantilevered joints are boxed in front and back.
Anyways, these picture may give some food for thought.
Where the roll structure attaches:
Have Atoms started coming with improved rear suspension bellcranks and wheel bearings yet?
http://www.dpcars.net/atom/am.htm Reading DP's investigation into the issues he had with his Atom soured me on their product for anything other than a cool looking play thing that can never reach it's full potential without re-engineering some of the car. Seems uncool for the price of the car.
In reply to Warren v:
Excellent point, thanks for the info.
My point was that crash safety analysis is very VERY difficult. With out crashing a few dozen chassis it's hard to know what will happened in a wreck. Arm chair structural analysis is about as useful as armchair crash analysis of similar but different designs.
The atom bowed and folded pretty predictably and the exo has noticeable structural differences in those places.
I feel the Exocet is probably as safe as something like that can be, and I look at wrecked cars every day for a living. I'd have no fear driving one.
Having looked at the skeleton of a Factory Five 818, my reaction was: 
ddavidv wrote: I feel the Exocet is probably as safe as something like that can be, and I look at wrecked cars every day for a living. I'd have no fear driving one. Having looked at the skeleton of a Factory Five 818, my reaction was:
Can you elaborate? In what capacity do you examine wrecked cars? And I wasn't able to read your reaction to the 818. :-)
turboswede wrote: Have Atoms started coming with improved rear suspension bellcranks and wheel bearings yet? http://www.dpcars.net/atom/am.htm Reading DP's investigation into the issues he had with his Atom soured me on their product for anything other than a cool looking play thing that can never reach it's full potential without re-engineering some of the car. Seems uncool for the price of the car.
Thanks for the link to the awesomeness that is dpcars.net
I spend several hour reading that guys stuff, once every couple years. THAT is the kind of person I want to buy a used car from.
Yep, makes me wish I had gone to school for engineering like I should have so I could potentially work with smart guys like that on fun projects like those. Instead I went into IT and, well, let's just say it's much less satisfying :/
Would anyone mind providing some pictures of the interior space? I compete in NASA Time Trials with a 1992 Acura Integra and can take four tires and all the weekend's tools and camping gear in the back. I'd like to know if you could fit the base essentials for a track weekend with a passenger:
I assume you could either move the passenger seat forward for storage behind the seat, or all the way back for storage up front? Can anything be done behind the roll bar?
Storage is not the Exocet's strong suit. You're best off with a small trailer.
There's enough room behind each seat for a big backpack. The passenger footwell also can hold more than the passenger's legs. It's enough for a weekend trip if you pack intelligently, but this thang ain't a GT.
Hey look, double diagonals, steel floors, wiring tray, and no powder. I wonder whose that is. (We've actually had a couple of that exact same configuration this month, but I didn't want to fib.)
IM VERY EXCITED!
I'm now trying to justify tubular control arms to go with my subframe.
If I decide to only do new bushings on my chassis what is the plus and minus of Poly vs. Mazdaspeed (style) uprated rubber? I think I should go back to stock sway bars and have not found the Mazdaspeed (style) rubber for the stock sways (of which I am missing the front bar).
Thanx 4 the update.
im going to call in morning add a set of wheels b4 you ship.
In reply to Warren v:
So I am guessing that the "particularly stoopid engine swap" is mine. If not, what else is someone trying to stuff in there? And what's the difference with the welds?
Heh, I was wondering if Warren would get called out for that. It's like I tell my staffers. "It's OK to think that our customers are morons, just keep it to yourself".
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