RE: IML: Was About Tom McCahill, and his judgement of the car in '67/ now demo guys

[dardal@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Quoting "Woolf,Richard T(Contractor)" <richard.woolf@xxxxxxxxxxxx>:

> I want someone in the club to define "tougher."
> 
> I find that very hard to believe that a unibody car is stronger than body on
> frame. Considering the size of the frame on my '66. My '66 is built like a
> tank, and is over 200 lbs. more than my '73 which as you all know is a
> unibody car.


Have you ever looked the front subframe of a 67-68?  If you did, the answer to
your question would have been obvious.  The front subframe on these cars is
actually bolted ont the body as if it was a body-on-frame car, plus there are
two subframes on top of the other.  Having said that, the unibody has an
advantage over the body-on-frame design.  Instead of having a finite number of
bolts joining the (sub)frame and body, there is a continous weld, so the body
and subframe flex or deform as a unit.  Its like the old story
(over-simplification), where its easier to bend 10 sticks individually than all
10 together, where the joined strength is more than the sum of the total. 
Modern body design has taken that to the extreme by building vehicles with
amazingly thin metal, and due to these weak structures, there is a
misconception that the unibody is inherently weaker.

D^2


-----------------  http://www.imperialclub.com  -----------------
This message was sent to you by the Imperial Mailing List. Please 
reply to mailing-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx and your response will be 
shared with everyone. Private messages (and attachments) for the
Administrators should be sent to webmaster@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
To UN-SUBSCRIBE, go to http://imperialclub.com/unsubscribe.htm