Dallara Body Kits - Which One?

Mark Olson

True Classic
I have been doing a bit of research on the Dallara body kits for an X1/9. The two that I have found are the one sold by MWB, and another sold by CASCU, http://www.cascu.co.uk/Start.htm , in the UK. I have found a couple good threads detailing the work involved in the MWB kit, however cannot find anything on the kit sold by CASCU. So my question:

Is there anybody who has installed the CASCU kit? If so, are you able to provide any commentary on it? This kit can be ordered with delivery in 2019, which would fit my time frame quite well.

Mark Olson
 
Here is Franco Fibercar from Italy that makes those kits https://www.facebook.com/franco.fibercar
http://www.fibercar.it/
dallara.jpg
 
Hi Mark,

This is a link to photos showing the fitting of a CASCU Dallara body kit. There is no narrative and there are lots of photos to wade through but it shows how the body is prepared and how the body kit fits. My car needed quite a few rust repairs. Some additional steel was added to properly support the wheel arches and weather seal the boot. The front lip didn't seem to fit and it was cut and widened. However, the next car we did we had more confidence and managed to fit the lip unmodified as it came from CASCU. These body kits were reportedly taken from a real Dallara. This means the front wings/fenders need quite a bit of fettling to fit the lines of the road car around the headlights if you want to retain headlight pods.

The other wrinkle with this kit is that it has the correct lengthened wheelbase of the original Dallara - you can see how the stock rear wheel sits too far forward in the arch. I worked out a simple mod to the rear ball joints to gain the required 15 mm or so in the wheelbase, well it was a simple concept but quite an effort to do. You have to remove the outboard rivet, grind off the welds inside the wishbone flanges and pivot the ball joint rearwards about the inboard rivet, with a new fixing hole provided 12 mm to the rear of the original hole. Re-fix the ball joint with an M10 bolt. There is enough width in the wishbone flanges to achieve this with no additional metal required. Once this is done you have to modify the handbrake cable fixing to the wishbone to allow the cable to reach the caliper. The handbrake cable itself will reach without modification, it just needs to be allowed to curve rearwards a little more. You also need to reset the rear wheel toe-in.

I hope this is of some use to you.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/wfc288yidtvp2yd/AAAF-F5XwA3uliTqwKAVpv9sa?dl=0
 
rachaeljf, thanks for sharing your pictures and information. While there was certainly some fit issues that were highlighted in the pictures, it seemed not too bad overall.

I noticed you stripped the fenders (wings?) completely off. How do the fiberglass pieces attach? Is there a "lip" that can be screwed/riveted/bonded where the old fenders were?

Also, did you consider modifying the fiberglass instead of the ball joint location? If so, what was the deciding factor that made you go the ball joint route?

I do like this kit and think I will get in line to buy one.
 
the kit that frnco from fiber kit sells is as close to "original" as you will get , cost is around starts from 1500 euro and up for full blown kit with glass doors ,

shipping around 1500$ i ended up with 3k for everything.

you need to make sure its "fresh" mold !

and you need a body guy that knows what his doing not just talking !
 
As I recall we tried to use the vertical lips left after cutting off the wings, but when fitting the GRP wings over them, the panel gaps were too small. So new vertical strips were added at the correct spacing to accommodate the thickness of the GRP panel and leave the correct panel gaps. You could cut off the wheel arch lip and re-glass it 15 mm further forward, but to keep faith with the original space framed Dallara I decided to modify the wishbones. This mod would have been much easier if the ball joints had been bolt in jobs like VW/Audi and others used!
 
Hi Matt, I have read lots of good things about MWB, and I have no doubt as I start this process in the spring I will trade a lot of my money for your products. Still in the planning stage so for the fender kit no firm decisions have been made. Not 100% certain I will go with the Dallara even (maybe 80%). However I also like the look of the flares that extend down to the front air dam as well.....
 
You can look through the process pics in my Dallara thread (linked in my sig) to get a sense of the specific install using the US kit MWB sells.

The US kit is 3 layer. Very substantial. Don't know about the EU kit, hopefully someone will comment as I don't recall that being mentioned.

IMO it is easier to align by using the stock sheet metal fender tops & blend into the vertical surface, than to deal with cutting into the inner fender support areas to make a 'full' fender work.

The rear treatment is different between the two - so look closely at pics of both as that may sway you one way or the other.

EDIT: Think hard about your wheel & tire choices. This is a major consideration that needs to be decided at the beginning, as how you deal with the inner fenders in part depends on clearance for the wider wheels & tires you want to use. Better to have them on hand for trial fitment DURING the build process or you may run into serious problems after the fact. Suspension mods should also be considered part & parcel of the job. So, multiply the cost of the body kit+shipping by 3-4x and you will have a reasonable base figure for the PARTS. Then add at least 25% for misc crap that comes up. Then add labor. :D
 
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Hussein, thanks for your comments. I have looked through your posts and appreciate all the pics and detailed writeup.
 
Looking back at that "Fibercar" kit Janis posted a picture of (top of thread). It seems to be enough of a complete body that you could build a custom tube chassis, with any drive-train and suspension you want, and hang that body. Basically a "silhouette" track car, without the need for a doner X at all. A ton of work but what fun it would be.
 
From my experience in ordering car parts from the other side of the world, I would recommend going with the kit that you can get "locally".
So much can go wrong.
There is no way to return the goods. What if the quality you receive is not the same quality that someone else received from the same source?
I have even been sent parts that were obviously rejects. "Send the bad part to the customer furthest away, he won't return it" seemed to be the thinking at times.

For instance I bought a complete dual exhaust for my 1967 Olds from a US specialist (we don't have muffler shops in Germany).
It was very expensive to get here and didn't fit at all.
Had I still lived in the US, I would have returned it for sure.
 
For instance I bought a complete dual exhaust for my 1967 Olds from a US specialist (we don't have muffler shops in Germany).
It was very expensive to get here and didn't fit at all.
They don't fit here either. And sending things back here is also very expensive, not to mention the high mark-up price in the first place. That's why I usually make everything myself.

Off topic, but isn't the largest American muscle car show in the world somewhere near you (maybe Sweden)? Europeans seem to really love our junky cars. But we seem to love European junky cars, so go figure.
 
Sorry, should have clarified - I meant the actual panels for comparison construction/thickness. I know what the kit looks like :)

Here are some pics of a front fender, typical for the kit.

Front fender

Fender.jpg


Close up of gelcoat - looks okay to me
Outside.jpg


Some rough spots that will need attention

Roughness.jpg



Inside
Inside.jpg


Thickness pictures - varies from 1/16 to 1/8, probably a 3/32 average, panels have good stiffness.

Thickness 1.jpg

Thickness 2.jpg
 
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