Anyone has this option? Pics? I noticed my car has a black plastic square behind the seats in the fire wall,is this the preparation for the Racing Seat Belts ?
Are you in the US? If so that plastic latch thing is probably only behind the passenger seat and is rather comically a latch for a child seat. Belts are not officially available on US cars. Various threads on this for 360CS from a while back that discuss back fitting with EU parts which I believe is also possible for a Scud. Consensus from many is don't fit w/o the roll bar also which was/is also only available as an EU option. Cost to find and fit the EU parts is probably pretty large. Daniel at Ricambi can certainly help.
For the U.S. version, you need to buy the latch pieces from Ferrari. That plastic thingy is for the child seat.
Correct,Daniel from Ricambi will give me the parts I need. People will love to have a complete kit for their scuds...
http://www.ricambiamerica.com/parts_catalogs.php?M=FE&P=&V=diag&I=110073 I would not advise the use of harnesses without fitting a rollbar in the event of an actual rollover, you will be stuck in the upright position with no structure to prevent the car's roof from caving in on you.
Pics from the seats, seat belts and roll-bar. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
If you are in the US, RIcambi will not sell you the set-up (ferrari roll-bar/harness) for liability reasons. I know. I tried.
I found a solution at Ferrari of Atlanta. They have a mechanic there that will custom make a harness bar for mounting belts. It looks and works great, with no damage to the car. I did this for my Scud. Send me a PM and i will put you in touch.
In the US you cant use 4-5-6 point restraints because of the DOT. Apparrently unless you can sit forward to look to the side its not allowed. Had a HUGE issue with my Elise which came with 6pt belts and I had to remount the regular belts once a year to inspect it... grrrr...
Actually this is 'general' information, which is well suited to most cars (and well worth following in the norm) but actually its not applicable to either the 360 or 430's chassis. Its aluminum spaceframe structure was designed so stiff from the outset that t can actually easily handle being upside down on its roof without 'caving in'. Its ridiculously strong! You can fit harness belts to a 360 but to do it safely you need to fit FIA approved load spreader plates behind the bulk heads which is time consuming as you need to remove a lot of parts.
I am not sure that is correct; the DOT allows aftermarket harnesses that comply with certain standards (materials, et al) and - here is the tricky part - use existing factory mounting points and/or anchorages. Most of the standard has to do with making sure the belts and anchors are in factory spec.... I have yet to encounter any rule that requires inertial reel (i.e. requires you to be able to bend forward and then have them retract)...would guess it varies state-by-state and there are standards if the intertial reels are there about their required performance. I have not researched this, but recently went through DMV inspection (and approval) for 2 relatively new cars that are road legal and had a harness system and a cage; both had the OEM belts removed. In my case, the cages were FIA labeled, maybe that helped; could be that my local DMV is lenient? Once I had the approval, I did ask 101 questions about the belts, hence my comments; I could be wrong but that was my experience. (interesting, I had to remove the fire system, as carrying an armed, pressurized system is not compliant!). As for the argument over harnesses and cages...I would love to see some research on it. What I do know is that having a roll cage, without a helmet you run the risk of some seriously hard head banging! My $0.02....if I'm going fast enough to want a harness (on a track), I tend to prefer having a full cage, harness and HANS. On the street, I tend to "trust" the car, airbags and 3-point belts. I only got these 2 cars certified/registered to be able to drive them from time to time on the street...to move them, more than to drive them quickly.
I'd call the DMV. In Communist Kalifornia the rules tend to be more strict than in NH, and I had issues here. I was told it was the lack of inertial belts that made mine not pass muster (you can not lean to check blind spots is what I was told). Also, not all belts are DOT approved so you'll need that as well as for a roll cage... you should never never never ride in a car with a roll cage without helmet UNLESS the cage is substantially padded. It can cause rather horrible injuries. I tend to feel if you need a cage, you need a helmet. HANS should be standard, I'm not sure what racing bodies dont require it, but based on what I saw doing medical standby for racing... I dont know why WOULDNT use it. I liked mine really. ha, almost forgot about the fire system, I used to not disclose that on inspection... thats a big nono on a road car IIRC
The 4 point belts are not legal in Australia either. I had them fitted to my 360 and most recently to my 430 Scuderia. It's a pretty big job and runs to about $10k (including the cost of the OEM Ferrari belts) if it's done correctly. If it's NOT done correctly it's flat out dangerous in an accident. First pic is the belts fitted in my 360. The rest are of the procedure and end result in my Scuderia. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
CA doesn't have safety inspection, only smog. I wouldn't use 4 point belts, street or track. Most track organizations will accept stock belt, but if you upgrade it has to be 5 or 6 pt. with proper mounting. The proper mounting is tricky as to both reinforcement and placement. Bolts and big washers really don't cut it. The stock belt with airbags are quite safe. If you have trouble moving around in the seat, CG makes a lap tightener that works well for less than $100. See: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lap-Belt-Cinch-Inc-CG001-CG-Lock-Seatbelt-Harness-/400280224413?hash=item5d328f829d&item=400280224413&pt=Race_Car_Parts&vxp=mtr or the CG site.
I think this discussion is extremely constructive. We can debate the pros and cons of harnesses in road cars; one aspect of this that we have not covered is the seats themselves. While called "racing seats", the seats are always a weak point in road cars. If someone were to add full harnesses (the right way) to a road car, I would suggest they consider putting (real) strong race seats that are FIA compliant. The last thing you want is to have strong harnesses and a seat that breaks under you (and note, road seats are supposed to deform in a high-g accident). The carbon race seats in our 458 are very comfortable, look great and I'm sure are "safe", but nowhere near as solid as the FIA-spec one-piece race seats in my race cars.
Those are Ferraris mounting brackets for the 4 point belts and the position is determined by Ferrari. It's hard to make out; but the nut is welded to the brackets as well. The forces required to make those brackets fail would be extreme and if they did, I would suggest you would probably be dead anyway. I would have gone to race seats and proper 6 point belts; but I wanted to retain the comfortable road seats rather than compromise usability of the car. I also retained the standard retractable belt so I can use either system.
Race seats are great, in a race car on a race track. They are seriously uncomfortable in a road car on drives of more than an hour or so. My last drive was 1300km's in a weekend, no way I would have contemplated it in proper FIA race seats.
I do not know many racing bodies that allow a 4pt belt any longer. When we did the elise it was 5/6 (6 is much more comfortable on my man parts...) or stick with stock belts. As for the seats... if youre really racing, you should be in a full cage and proper seats; if its for looks... just leave the stock belts, the car is sexy enough
