23 replies to this topic

[mini danny]

Hiya im just wondering will i gain anythink by seam welding the subframe joints if not i won't bother


thanks Danny

[myredmini]

Will stop moisture entering and strengthen the join, i would..

[mini danny]

Will stop moisture entering and strengthen the join, i would..

ya i may as well then and then they are.getting powdercoated :)

[myredmini]

go for it

[mini danny]

:) got a job for this week end then lol

[dklawson]

Keep moisture out or trap moisture in?

I don't think you'll find lots of reports of subframe failures because they were not seam welded. It is your car so by all means do what you feel appropriate. The worst that will happen is you may get some weld burn and be out some time and money.

[Ethel]

Front or rear? You can be sure it'll burn off some paint in the least accessible areas, will you be able to replace it? If the intention is to make it beefier add some reinforcing webs to the internal corners

[tiger99]

If it is a non-genuine replacement rear subframe, in my opinion it MUST be welded (not necessarily full seam welds), as the cowboy manufacturers use far fewer spot welds than were considered to be safe by Rover. This is particularly true of the rear subframe, where the side members join the main crossmember, a very highly stressed area which carries the full load of the suspension cones, five times the instantaneous wheel load. The amount of welding requires to fix that is not great, four runs (top and bottom each side) of maybe 3 inches, but you may as well reinforce the other joints too.

A few people who use their cars hard, and likely some rally teams, have been known to seam weld the front subframe too, and it does no harm.

[mini danny]

Thanks i have no idea if genuine or not will have a look and ya can't do any harm so will put a few runs on it


thanks Danny

[tiger99]

I hope you are taking it out to do the welding, as you need to weld it top and bottom.

[03jkirk]

i heard that seam welding the subframe adds a lil more rigidity to the from end firming everything up to improve the handeling not nessaserly to improve the strength even thos it would strengthen it

[mini danny]

The subframes not in the car it hasn't been for 2 years hahaha and ya that's what i herd and i like better handling hahaha

[03jkirk]

i say this is done to improve handeling but on a road car i believe it would make handeling worse due to the roughness of british roads, on a smooth track a stiff car is better but on uneven roads stiff cars are more likely to suddenly loose grip and spin, this is why on road cars 10 inch wheels are better for road holding as they adsorb the lumps and bumps of the road better than 13s which jus tranfer it to the suspention and the shell causing a slight bounce causing lose of grip

[mini danny]

Ya i never thought of it like that now i really dont know what to do

Dan

[Cooperman]

IMHO seam welding of the front sub-frame is unnecessary except for a small amount on gravel-road rally cars. The front sub-frame does not distort by any measureable amount in road driving so neither road-holding nor handling will be affected. The main thing is to solidly bolt the front sub-frame in.
However, the rear sub-frame, particularly the after-market copies, can be a bit low on strength and a bit of sensible welding can be a good thing. Make sure you re-paint properly after doing any welding to avoid early corrosion.