Hi there I have a set of Fatman dropped uprights for my 53 Chevy here in NSW Australia. My engineer tells me that the new Fatman Uprights that I have bought need to be load tested. It all seems like a bit of a mess around. Does anyone know of a way around this? Are the load testing results available anywhere?
Ask Fatman for certification and advise them why it is required for engineering certification. Do it any other way other than the right way and if something goes wrong, your **** is toast. You need to find out who else has them and get a copy of their report, at your cost.
Rod Hadfield had to go to a huge amount of trouble to get his dropped spindles approved here in Australia. You will have to prove that yours are at least equal to original equipment. If you Google Rod Hadfield or Stubtech you might find some answers. I just Googled Stubtech and he makes approved spindles for 55 Chev. Can you convert to the control arms from one of these?
I'm guessing that trying to fit '55 spindles could be a bit hard. They appear to be quite different, but I'm not sure. I am worried this is going to be one of those dragged out situations.
i'm currently looking around for places in Sydney that can get these load tested. Wouldn't know where to start! I'll definitely check out those pickup spindles.
You could try Marloc Engineering in Queanbyan. They did a lot of ch***is testing for me on an ICV. Speak with Mario on 0262993400 and he may give you other leads if he can't help but it's a start.
Would you have to buy the second set after the test? If they load test them, don't they load the first set until they break?
Load testing would apply a load higher than expected. After the load testing, a working load would be a reduced load from the testing load usually at a factor of 2:1 or 1.5:1. Load testing is done on cranes all the time (annually I believe) and the testing load is higher than the crane safe working load. To the OP - contacting the manufacturer would be the best way to determine any load test certification or rating. Whether the engineer would sign off on your parts as being qualified by similarity to a manufacturer's specification would be a question for the engineer.
Hey all. Just an update. My engineer looked at the Fatman uprights that I have and said straight away that he wouldn't engineer them, mainly due to their welded construction. Later on I thought I'd found a good thing when I found an image of some forged uprights from Fatman on the net. I emailed them about the forged ones and got a detailed reply from Brett: "We were never able to get our forging and machining vendors together so the one piece forged uprights are a dead issue. We only do the welded form. I have spent a LOT of time working with the NZ LVTCC to get this issue of fabricated products resolved, with out good effect. By the time we do all the aerospace level testing on EVERY piece of EVERY product, costs get so high that the entire deal is impractical. It is simply too expensive for customers and not profitable for us. They will not accept welded or cast parts which leaves us without a viable alternative. We do more testing than most manufacturers, yet they will not accept our empirical testing. According we have essentially removed ourselves from the Australian and NZ market. Other US street rod parts manufacturers are having the same issues. In my opinion, the restrictions are unreasonable and unwarranted, based on a couple incidents from less diligent manufacturers who choose to use substandard Chinese components which have caused failures. If they would simply allow testing of sample then clear a product, we might be able to return, but that position seems not acceptable to the parties in power at this time. Everyone is in favor of safety, but reasonable standards should be implemented, in my opinion. But I am here and they are in charge, so we chose to bow out, to the loss of all involved. I believe you will see this in the end amount to an embargo of parts made here going there." So there you have it. As it stands, the nose of my Chevy must remain pointed skyward. Safety first, and all that.
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