ra65 crossmember into ra28

[barned01]

Yes I know, use ke70/ae86.
but for the sake of this argument lets say we use an ra65 crossmember
With a bit of filing, I can get the rear holes of the crossmember to fit to the rear holes of the chassis rail.
This leaves the front holes of the cross member about 20mm away from the front holes of the chassis rail (the chassis rail bolt holes being wider than the cross member bolt holes)

so i see 2 ways to rectify this.
1. drill a hole in the chassis rail, insert a thick wall hollow tube that will allow the standard xmember bolt to go inside of and then bolt as per the bolt holes on the xmember. Assuming I have to weld the tube in place, should I be cutting a small access point inside the wheel well to get to the the tube from inside the rail, tack it into place and then weld the access point back up again or can i simply weld it to the rail from the outside but clean the weld afterwards so no weld points are sitting proud of the chassis rail)

2. cut a bit of the side of the cross member off, weld in a small extension metal plate/angle iron to the underside of the cross member and drill through this plate to line back up with the chassis rail hole? maybe also box the plate/angle iron back to the crossmember side walls all around to restore what would be the original webbing.

I would have thought option 1 was the more structurally friendly, but if i am attaching the plate to the bottom of the crossmember in method 2 then i assume that would also be equally strong as the plate holds the crossmember into the position

thoughts?

[Spectre]

option 2

Basically the same as KE70 - done here



Cut ends off crossmember to suit. Drill new holes in crossmember to suit chassis rails. Bolt up.

Not sure what your geometry is going to be like in terms of LCA location etc.

[thechuckster]

I've seen option A done to an RA40 chassis (which is near enough to an A28). Was done to fit a 3SGE and upgrade the brakes to RA65/MA61 spec.

2 holes line up and are bolted up temporarily, the other two holes are marked onto the chassis, then drilled over-size, new crush-tube (to suit the OD of the bolts) then inserted into new holes, tube welded at both ends to the chassis rail, tube and excess weld ground down flush with chassis rail, fit cross member. Don't try to shift the existing tube, just add new tube.

You will have to muck around with fitting different lower control arms to get your track and camber under control.