I was at the display at Wivenhoe Dam today, 19 July and for the most part was impressed. What did concern me was two HQ Monaro coupes with 4 point racing harnesses fitted. Apart from being illegal, any car fitted with inertia reel seat belts from new must retain them at all times. The real concern is that both cars had the shoulder belts mounted to the floor behind the seats. Harness belts must be mounted with the shoulder straps as near as possible to horizontal, the rear parcel shelf or roll bar. You can mount them to the floor if there is a cross bar in the roll cage behind the seat at shoulder height. Just sitting in the car with the belts mounted to the floor behind the seats might feel OK but when you have an impact from front or rear all the force is transferred to your body and therefore the seat back because which is not designed to stand the G forces. Your body weight increases by anything up to 10 times in a major impact. Mounting them on the parcel shelf brings other issues such as you can't have rear seat passengers. Harness might look good but there are a lot of issues when fitted to street cars. Have a look at any race car and you will see what I mean.

Lazlo.