stich welding.....yes or no

hi, im after abit of advice, has anyone whos carried out a 1.8 turbo conversion done any seam welding to add some strengh to the front end, ino that it is done alot on vauxhalls, im currently converting my golf and wondered wether its worth doing it before it goes off for paint, any ideas welcome. thanks

Don't add strength in front of the front axle, since this is the crumple zone and should be kept as-is to work properly. Stitch welding is a technique where you leave gaps instead of continuous welding, its used in areas as a safety thing so that if one weld cracks, it doesn't propigate to the whole join and fail/fall off.

By all means seam weld areas between the axles but there's not really anything in between not doing it, or doing the entire shell, pillars and all, etc which would be time consuming! A weld-in cage + sills + weld in seat mounts and proper racing seats would be a reasonable addition of strength.

yeah the crumple zone thing i can understand now from being told it, i might do a few addtions just on the turrets and legs etc, but i dont recon ill do the whole shell,id rather do it before its painted then a month down the line have to do it and repaint the bay again, thanks, ill get cracking 2moro.

it's done on nova's as the front ends weren't spot welded as often as vw did. they tend to split with anything bigger than the gte motor fitted. and even that at full power will probs tear the engine mountings out the car. Infact vaux provde a full bracing kit including weld in reinforcements for almost the whole engine bay lol. It's still listed in parts books!!

Vw did a better job, so just reinforce the engine mounts and fit a strut brace front and rear and it should be fine.

If you really wanted too you could weld a plate onto the strut top mount as a precaution but unless you plan on rallying it it should be fine standard.

Jon.

Weld in a L section to brace between steering rack mounts as well…and stotch the rack mounts.   The spot welds on them can (and do) fail.

Have a gander on CGTI, it's a common mod for track guys.

hi, yes, my friend has welded in the whole strenghting kit and also stich welded every seam up aswell to help it all, oh well i made a start before reading this so ill have to do the other side to suit, and il do all around the steering rack mounts, can never be to careful and id rather it be 'over built' in a way. thanks guys