Grand Vitara gets custom made skid plates

[dadu]

A salute to the conceiver, executer and the whole team involved in this. A very well planned task.

You got good support from the A.S.S too. What a bunch of enthusiasts!!!.

btw, did you check how much weight did the whole thing add to the GV.

[Jeep]

A well planned, executed project. Nothing else gives as much satisfaction as it does.

Great work and even better explanation of it, Samurai. Enjoy your offroad experiences.

[rjstyles69]

Super cool job there my friend, missed this thread somehow.
Now we all know where to head in case something like this is needed .

[Technocrat]

Excellant Pictorial Samurai.

This looks great,I am sure you must be feeling much more confidant off roading with these plates.

Congratulations

[munishsurendra]

Fantastic work and a great discription with pics.Congrats and enjoy your ride.

Well, Wats the total cost involved?

[hkanitkar]

Holy shmuks... we are really a mad bunch of car lovers here !

Awesome work Samurai san ! Hats off !!

[Samurai]

Thanks for all the overwhelming feedback. I am still awaiting the bills.

As expected, the GC has decreased. It used to be 200mm at the transfer case near the center of the wheel base, which was the lowest hanging and vulnerable part. After the skid plates, the GC is down to 170mm, but can take hard hits.

No, it doesn't hit big speedbumps, I have lots of them around. Even if it hits the speedbump, I don't need to worry, not at the low speeds one crosses big speedbumps...

[vivekiny2k]

Originally Posted by Samurai

As expected, the GC has decreased. It used to be 200mm at the transfer case near the center of the wheel base, which was the lowest hanging and vulnerable part. After the skid plates, the GC is down to 170mm, but can take hard hits.

I have a weird feeling you are scouting for lift kits now

Edit: Good job by the way, I prefer getting bare minimum cars/bikes and adding pieces of my own choice. My interior upgrade is pending for my Quest.

[aah78]

Originally Posted by vivekiny2k

lift kits

Are you talking about the air-bag kits - the ones which can lower and raise your car/SUV?

They're nice but the costs can be around a lakh of Rupees, or more.

[Samurai]

I did some mud-plugging on my birthday to see the efficiency of the skid plates.

The plates definite provide bullet proof protection, but it also got me into trouble, more than once. The front two plates are fine, but the three rear plates mounted on brackets are reducing the GC royally and I couldn't get over certain obstacles because of them. I think I should not keep the rear plates permanently mounted, but use them only when going on rocky road safaris.

[nitrous]

6mm is a big difference in GC?

[smsrini]

Kudos on the effort. Ingenious thinking and brilliant execution.

Normally the underside of a car is designed for two purposes : Cooling and aero dynamics. The grooves or channels in the stock skid plates are supposed to achieve this. To some extent the wind noise as well.

It would be interesting to see how this modification affects the two parameters.

Agree Aluminium can be a good heat sink if fabricated properly. I say this since the heat sinks I've seen are typically with a lot of 'fins' that aid to dissipate the heat rather than a flat surface.

[Rehaan]

Originally Posted by nitrous

6mm is a big difference in GC?

6mm is only the thickness of the sheet.

The sheet is in fairly flat peices and does not conform to the underside as a perfect/glove-like fit, therefore the increase is a lot more than 6mm. Add to that the additional drop in clearance due to the mounting brackets etc.

cya
R

[Blue Thunder]

Originally Posted by nitrous

6mm is a big difference in GC?

Samurai mentioned a loss of GC to the extent of 30mm.

Originally Posted by Samurai

...As expected, the GC has decreased. It used to be 200mm ... After the skid plates, the GC is down to 170mm, ...

[nitrous]

30mm difference is too much.
Calls for a redesign at the mounts,Sharath Power ji