Roll Bars Turn Car On Its Side

Roll Bars Turn Car On Its Side FARM HOME Cars 34-4-37 Kees Koster really dislikes working on the underside of a car. His answer is to turn the car on its side with his custom made roll bars. "I got the idea from a commercial unit I saw at a car show," explains Koster. "Using a battery powered drill and some pivot arms, they laid a Mercedes safely on its side. I came up with a simpler version, and it didn't cost $1,500 like the show model." He first takes the wheels off one side of the car and then attaches roll bar brackets to both hubs. The brackets are pieces of curved pipe. "I welded two of them to each of two rims that matched the rotors on the car axles that I wanted to lay on its side," explains Koster. "I then put a chain around the front wheel on the opposite side and lift, being careful to keep the chain away from the car body panels." With the car "rolled" over, he could easily work on it. However, he recognized a couple of ways to improve the process. One was to modify the brackets so they could be used on other cars. To do so, he cut away most of the rims and torched two holes in what remained. "When I want to work on a different car, all I have to do is find two discarded rotors that matched the car," says Koster. "Once I've burned two holes in the rotors, I can bolt them to the brackets." Koster says to safely roll the car over, the brackets need to be attached to the car with at least four if not five bolts. Using matching rotors makes that easy to do as the bolt holes match up exactly. He also realized that as the car was rolled, it placed tremendous torque on the steering wheel. Simply engaging the steering wheel lock is not enough. However, attaching a straight edge such as a 2 by 4 to both brackets eliminates the problem. A third problem involved lifting the car. Instead of hoisting it from a wheel on the soon to be "high" side, he now removes the former lift wheel and bolts a steel bar to the under-frame. Using a bar slightly longer than the underside of the car is wide gives him a lift point that is safely removed from the car body. Finally, he puts two posts under the car to hold it in place. "It works great, especially for working on the exhaust system," says Koster. "I only take the battery and engine oil out, though you do need to empty heavy objects out of the trunk. I've had a car sit on its side like that for a month at a time and have it start right up when returned to all four wheels." Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Kees Koster, 131 Cogmagun Rd, RR # 1, Center Burlington, Nova Scotia Canada B0N 1E0.

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