As seen in vendor announcements, M7 beat JCW to market ! That's right, the M7 strut brace is out. Look, see:



There are a couple of interesting things about it that I think we should discuss. First off, it seems to protect from balooning strut towers. Second, it's modular, so you can remove the center part to get to the oil filter. It also says it clears the factory airbox... Do any of the other bars do this? I think I want one .

 

the question i want answered is wether or not it will clear an MC battery box......

how about making a modified battery lid if it doesnt....??

 

It looks very pretty but I have some concerns. Where the machining has been done, on the tower brackets to clear the tower contours and the bottom of the cross brace where it passes over the airfilter, the inside cuts appear to be square cuts and not radiused. This will create a stress point that will lead to failure.

To transfer any tension loads from one tower to the other is your system relying just on the fastners or are there machined lugs and shoulders that take the actual load? It seems unreasonable to believe that the towers will flex in one direction and not the other.

But very nice machined logo!

 

moving the battery to the boot where it belongs? This would actually provide an effective Mod for better weight distribution. The need for a strut tower brace is questionable on a MINI. On some other cars they are a must have.

 

I wonder if the BMP intake clears this?


Jm

 

It sure is pretty Makes me want to sell my Carbon Fiber STB and get this one

 

I agree......very sloppy design work on the bottom of the tower pads. Looks to be a real paint scrapping design.

 

I will give it a serious Track thrashing, Looks GOOOD to me !!!

 

It doesn't look like it would move and scratch the paint, but it does look snug for strength:



The thing about the strut towers in our cars is that they can sometimes bend when hitting potholes at speed. I'm hoping this may help that... The only other solution I'd seen prior was the good ol' 2x4 and mallot .

 

I agree with the thickness is adding support to the top of the strut towers, that was not my concern. It just appears that all of the loads must be transfered by the fastners, from the tower to the brace pad, from the brace pad to the cross bar(both tension and compression loads), within the cross bar are 4 more fastners that must transfer tension loads.

red rage, I would be interested to hear your thoughts after the track thrashing.

 

One of the coopers on my team is looking to have it test fitted to see if it clears.

There is already a modified battery lid available at promini.com if you want one

 

After 2 days at the track and 6 months of canyon thrashing, I see no ill effects on the strut brace.

Bill

 

I'll soon be beating the s1ht out of the bar too! I'll let y'all know.

 

I doubt it. Compare to your wheels: despite what one might at first think the lug bolts are not loaded in shear and don't carry the wheel torque. Instead they're loaded in tension, providing friction between the wheel and hub which transfers torque. It's hard to know whether the three 8mm strut hat bolts are big enough that their tension can transfer the load completely to friction, but at the very least they're not much loaded in shear.

The same applies but even more so to the crossbar bolts.

I agree that it would nicer had the bottom surface cutouts on the mounting plates been milled with a radiused cut, but to say that it "will" fail is silly. There's still a ton of material there.

Neil

 

I am not a big fan of some products that M7 makes. But, I got to hand it to Peter and his crew ... really nice work on this strut brace. I'll be calling soon for an order.

 

Just wated to chime in on the M7 STB discussion....

After literaly looking at all the braces on the market, and hearing about the
problem with 'mushrooming" strut towers we decided to make a plate that would
possibly cure this phenomena. As for the cutouts in the plate being square instead of rounded of.....it makes no difference as the plate does not touch the rounded area of the ST IE. it lands squarely on the flat part as it get's bolted down. As for the notch in the brace, here's an image to show the radiused cut.

peter

 

 

If the M7 strut fit with the Alta CAI or which strut fit or if anyway i need to make a little cut.

 

It will fit WITHOUT cutting

 

I like

peter
Team M7
562-608-8123

 

The brace clears the Alta CAI just fine.