Lowered floor in R300

[croftsj]

I'm about to order a lowered floor panel for the R300, couple of quick questions follow. I'm only doing drivers side.

1: How easy is it to fit? I guess there are a lot of rivets to remove, followed by a lot to put back!

2: How much headroom so to speak will I gain? I've seen figures of anything between 1.5 inches and 3 inches to be gained? I have a FIA roll bar and a Roadsport cage which are same dimension, the cage is for trackdays only and currently with skid lid I'm poking out the top of the cage ooh err.

Ta

[sjmmarsh]

It gives you about 2" of extra headroom, but you lose about 1" of legroom as the shaping in the floor means the seat can't get all the way back (if you have the S-type seats).

There are a LOT of rivets - I got CC to do mine.

Steve

[darren f]

I think the consensus is that an air rivetting gun is an absolute necessity - the fixing rivets are steel and you need Popeye-esque forearms to put them in with a hand rivet gun.

Assuming you haven't done a search on Blatchat yet, there's lots of useful stuff here
..and here
....and here

Please post on how you get on... this is something I've been thinking about doing myself

[fergus]

The back edge of the lowered floorpan is vertical, so you shouldn't need to lose *any* leg room. You may need to modify the seat runners if you use them. Why not go for a moulded foam seat? Easy to do with some help.

May sure you run a good bead of sealant around the edge of the panel prior to mounting it.

Using a hand rivet gun isn't that bad at all. Leave the air tools for the ladies. I found that several holes needed to be either redrilled or just drilled in order to fit the floor. From recollection, only a few holes are predrilled. A small cordless drill is a big advantage.

[croftsj]

Thanks for the pointers, I pick the car up on June 14 and already I have 'upgradeitis' which is a worry.

[fergus]

croftsj said:

'upgradeitis'....

You can get a lot out of any car you buy after a few basic checks/setup, etc

- lowered floor
- *full* service from a caterham specialist (preferably one who runs a race team, rather than Caterham)
- suspension/ride height setup

Don't forget that there are quite a few high powered Caterhams out there which are not driven that quickly (realtively) on track... Power isn't everything (but the more the better! )

good luck. let us know what you settle on buying!

[B@W]

fergus said:

croftsj said:

'upgradeitis'....

You can get a lot out of any car you buy after a few basic checks/setup, etc

- lowered floor
- *full* service from a caterham specialist (preferably one who runs a race team, rather than Caterham)
- suspension/ride height setup

Don't forget that there are quite a few high powered Caterhams out there which are not driven that quickly (realtively) on track... Power isn't everything (but the more the better! )

good luck. let us know what you settle on buying!

Are there any Caterham specialists near Manchester?