If you have those in a vice, and you bend them....it would have to be through force applied from the side by pushing against the flat surface. From what I understand these dampers have ball joints at each end. So these plates wouldnt experience any sideways force against it....they only experience it from front to back. The way they are positioned...it would take a mighty hard knock to bend them in a front to back manner.

(that was hard to word, let me know if you get where I'm going with it)

 

Nice job Arly & Steve.

Here's a pic of the "official" LOTF mounting solution.

 

Partsman, to answer your question, yes the aluminum is taped with nuts on the back side. The fastners are polished SS ( 2 @ 5/16, 3 @ 3 3/16 button heads ). The plate supplied w/kit is under the frame horn, large end toward the rear to take into account the direction of force. The MM piece is 1 1/4 angle cut & angled so the damper is flat in line with the frame horn. The angle is a little less steep than the LOTF kit ( not by much ).
At the time of this instalation I wanted better access than the intended design. I had no idea you guys were planning a revision. The problem with this instsall, as a consumer piece, it's not just a bolt on. I did send a pic to LOTF. He replied with a pic of the revision hardware, way more better. I have at least 1 more to make for an 06, another NAMer, same style.
Glad you like it!

This pic was posted on the OCC thread to show the alternate connection method ( best ).

 

Just the pic that was needed

 

Steve,
Great job! When I do stuff like this I try not to drill new holes because I always think I am weakening the parts sometimes. That is why I went my direction. I have 2 OCC setup in my car and this was a way to have this on my 02 MCS.

 

I'm with you about drilling holes but in this case here is a lot of material to be had, you could cut big holes without issue. Your design is fine as is the material used & the only reason I did not use the top of the MM was I wanted the damper lower with minimal extra pieces ( which was a pluse of the original design & the reason I bought it ). 2 different ways to get from point A to B.
Bottom line, without people, like yourself, we would know nothing.... So you just keep doing what you are doing......

 

very nice. i just picked up a texas speedworks dampner. now that is one product that has nice manufacturing.

 

Here's my solution--before painting the brackets:

If you have HID Xenons ('05 and on) you have very little room to mount the damper before hitting the ballast for the lights.
Steve--as always you have come up with a very elegant solution!! I *love* the bracket with the 3 threaded bolts. woohoo.

There are lots of us "home grown" engineers out here.

 

Confirmation from an expert. I can sleep better tonight.

 

The mock up:


The Damper, DIY Brackets and the Stainless Hardware:


Just bought a metal bandsaw at Harbor Freight for $150 on sale. What a buy! Is there any interested if I make a few for those out there with this setup?

 

Here is my final engine bracket setup.

 

I find it interesting that all the braketing for the dampers in this thread are in such a fashion that the dampers are to dampen a pulling force on the unit and not a pushing force.

I was of the impression that the force of the engine pushed towards the back of the car. Other then stressing the rubber bushings inside the damper how do these actually do any dampening. Basically all you are doing is lashing the engine down... to do this you certainly would not need any of the shaft of the damper.

 

I am reinforcing the stock dampener. Anyone want to chime in??

 

as that part went away in 05 or so. I think someone makes a poly insert kit for the holes in the stock rubber.

Matt

 

The damper body contains two thick bushings that dampen in either direction.

The shaft is simply there for the overall length. No need to adjust the length on both sides of the damper.

 

Arly, I totally love that you got out there and did this on your own. Most folks wouldn't bother...

I do have one question. The lower bracket raises the damper up which will add additional stress to the frame area that it is mounted to (standard fulcrum stuff. I haven't done any test with the damper, but is that additional stress going to be too much for that piece of steel to handle? Do you think that it might cause bending or warping of that frame piece?

Just curious.

 

I'd love to see if there's a way to temporarily replace the damper with a digital strain gauge, to see what the magnitude of the forces from the engine movement really are. This would go a long way toward quantifying what's *really* required as far as material strength goes.

 

**double post**

 

The way I have it set up on my 2002, I am just reinforcing the stock oem dampener. The forces should be minimum. I might be more concerned if this was the only dampener in the system I would go the route of using the holes for the oem dampener if I had a 2004 MCS when the oem dampener was removed.

 

first is while there are concerns for bending with the brackets, no one has really run into the issue, so if it comes up, just make it from stronger stuff. No FEA required!

Second, and probably more importantly, is as the damper is at a larger and larger angle relative to the motion direction, the allowable range of motion of the damper gets reduced. I think the Mini engine likes to swing a lot more than the dampers range of motion even with perfect alignment, and this will just get worse with angle. Non-ideal allignments act to effectivly stiffen the damper even more.

Matt

 

You should sell your mounting bracket design to LOTF then have him mass produce those.

 

The upper mount still looks like it bolts though the rubber bushing. Is this true? If so the damper won't have any purpose.

 

I will check how much movement this damper has using a tie wrap around the shaft at the juncture between the damper body and shaft. If it moves, then it is doing something. If it does not, then it is just bracing the oem damper frame. If you look at the oem dampener system there is a main isolator at the strut mount area frame and then the rubber bushing that is attached to the bolt I am using to mount my bracket. Since the LOTF dampener is stiffer it should be doing some work in dampening. I made my bracket system this way because I have 2 OCC setup and I was using a bracket to suspend the front Oil Catch Can.

 

Here is the gap measurement after running the car for a commute to work. It looks like the damper is being used in unison with the stock damper.

 

Lord,
Are these a new style brack for your damper? I have one of your dampers with a different mounting style and it bent in a week from what seemed to be the angle.