Hello, Being that this car will sit much lower than stock,I made my own bars instead of puchasing them from somewhere else because of this very problem plus I wanted the bars to be tied into a stronger structure other then the 20 gauge sheet metal of the cowl. I have 1 inch distance from the tire and the bar with the suspension fully extened upward. (like in the second picture) NOT TOTAL SUSPENSION TRAVEL. Enless something in the suspension breaks that would be plenty of clearance. But I notice that your bar looks like its mounted lower then mine on the shock tower. That is where it will hit if the suspension bottoms out. Hopefully you checked your tire clearance? These are things you need to address now while you mock your car up. Looks like you may have welded them in fully aready.

Suspension fully extended upward

The work is looking good and progressing along nicely.

I appreciate your concerns but the tube is angled steeply above the tire to the existing support which clearly allows plenty of clearance. I do like the way you have tied the tube into the door frame structure and may be something I may add as I too am not totally happy with the connection to the thin firewall metal.

Just asking, but is there an advantage to a bar with such a dramatic 90 degree bend as opposed to just a straight tube going from the inner fender to the firewall area?

You always better off to go with strait brace if you can. With me tying it into the lower cowl and kick panel I didn't have that option.

I added a cowl bar today as I wanted to add some ridgity to the upper part of the cowl(I plan on some hard cornering and Autocrossing ect.) I started with 4 1/8 thick steel plates mount in the door support area and 1 1/2 1/8 wall DOM tube. I had to modify the steering column support and the dash frame.

Dash frame installed

Steering column support modification

End view

I had to remove the original windshield frame corner braces. I will have to either modify of make new ones. One thing I must note, if you plan on this modification you might not be able to use your factory dash cluster or heat and Ac box. Since I am using a vintage air unit and a custom gauge cluster it wont be a problem.

Dash frame clearance

Other pictures are available at http://s1187.photobucket.com/albums/z400/customachinecomponents/71%20Cuda%20Pro-Touring%20Build/

After some careful measuring I made the mounts today for the main hoop of the roll bar. What I did is, use 1/8 thick plate, trianglate the area from the rocker to the frame connector.

Using a competion engineering 1 3/4 diam .134 wall Roll bar loop .I am gonna build the rest of the cage off this.

6 inches from rear head rest

interior picture

After some more careful measuring,I finished trimming the main roll bar hoop. Then measured back at a angle from the top of the roll bar hoop to the rear frame rails. I ended up cutting into the back seat area being careful not to disturb any main supports to the rear seat. I will have to modify the upper rear seat frame for the main hoop to rear frame rail tubes to run through. Then I ended notching 2 tubes and sent them locally to be blasted and epoxy primed. When it comes back I will figure the rest. I want to make the rear crossbrace and front supports removable.

Notching the roll bar rear support tubes