Superfluous crossmember pieces?

[cjridert1]

Still kicking around 1pc vs 3pc design.
Ive read that the 2 factory north south crossmember bars arent necessary for drag/street cars.
Fast cars are using just the front horizontal bar are frames are lasting?
Seems the frame is predisposed to flexing/separating without those N/S bars

Anyway, just looking to see if anyone has had any issues with the 1pc crossmember for 1g AWD chassis.

Thanks

 

[2GFWDbeast]

well if you go with the 3 piece it will be 13 pounds lighter

 

[MY1GDSM]

But, that has nothing to do with what their asking... . I don't think anyone has reported problems running with-out one. I guess IMO if you want the piece of mind go 3 piece

 

[2GFWDbeast]

you didnt help him either, so what was the point of saying what you said. Any information is better then none.

 

[MY1GDSM]

Actually I did, as I said I do not know of any reports of problems from people running them...

 

[99gst_racer]

In the 2 years that I've been building them, I haven't heard of any issues with running without the north/south bars. There's 60-something of my single-bar crossmembers out there in use too.

 

[bastarddsm]

My K member cracked from running without. Might be an isolated case.

 

[99gst_racer]

My K member cracked from running without. Might be an isolated case.

Got a pic? I'd be curious to see where it cracked. It's not too often you hear about cracking subframes at all.

 

[motozachl]

In the 2 years that I've been building them, I haven't heard of any issues with running without the north/south bars. There's 60-something of my single-bar crossmembers out there in use too.

I've had mine for about a year and had zero issues. Unless you were into autocross I wouldn't give it another thought

 

[cjridert1]

My buddy told me he pulled his 2 north/souths out and couldnt get the holes even close to match up after a month. He pulled a couple other things for weight saving, so it wasn't a good controlled variable test. It's just been on the back of my mind and was looking for any similar stories.

 

[TwoLiterLaser]

My Galant had been put through this abuse before I acquired it. When I re-installed the two braces I had difficulty making the requisite mounting holes align correctly.

My previous AWD swapped Colt did not have the front/rear braces but it did have a tubular lower support up front welded to the "frame rails" and a solid engine mount welded to the fire wall in a sport where the fire wall was 4 or 5 layers thick.