Well quite.
As previously written, G4 accessories are ridiculously expensive and ludicrously rare, such is the case of the 3DR roof light bar.
Apparently only made for 9 event vehicles, for one stage of the G4 challenge (Brazil 2006), these bars are rarer than rocking unicorn shit.
A few owners have made their own versions, so I thought I'd make mine.
But first some groundwork.
I will use thin rubber to protect my paintwork, but I wanted a bit more protection. So I ordered some 3M DiNoc carbon fibre film and applied it to the roof between the rail finishers.
Although I am worried it looks a bit "Ricer", it does look ok and should do well against the odd scratch. I'll get some more at a later date and cover the paint between the sunroofs and the hardback too.
Under the rail finishers lie some folded seams, left over from when the sides were welded to the roof. Here is where we will attach the light bar.
Sure, a bit rough and will be painted before I finish.
I like the idea of removing the bar when not in use so I came up with a clamp that fits under the fold, with a finisher screwed on top.
As shown, the slot is manoeuvred under the fold and the cover screws on top. The cover is made to resemble the original rail finisher.
It evolved a little... And after a little thought I was worried about clearance to get a bolt and a screw into the front nut, so I welded a short length of stud to the nut (it's easier to get a nut on and lower the bar into position as its done up).
Now it was time to make the bar itself.
I bought a length of box section, and cut out a pair of U shaped feet from it. Shaping to make it look better and drilling it to match the clamp nuts.
Next up was a length of 27mm steel tube, to act as the light bar. This was bent slightly to follow the roofline. I made up some small brackets for the lights (I added a 5th one to the centre to mimick the antenna bracket found on the genuine item).
The centre one was welded to the centre part of the bar and all offered up to place. Once cut to length and the brackets modified to allow the bar to partially recess I tried it in place again and was pleased with the results.
The bar sits nice and low, lower than the original, so when the lights are fitted I should still have no worries with low barriers.
And it's fairly discreet. The carbon film helps this, but with lights attached it's obviously going to stand out some more.
Now to weld the bar together, at the correct angle for both curves of the roof. This was slightly problematic as I don't want to do any welding actually on the car, rather measure, mark and weld in the safe confines of my back garden.
This was achieved albeit with a small angle error on one of the feet, but prepared for this I glued some neoprene foam to the bottom to hide this sin (and protect the paintwork).
A few coats of lidl "hammer blow" paint and here we have it!
Painted, welded and lamp mounts welded too. I just need to get another pair of lamps and I'll make a start wiring it all together.
The clamps work well, the bar doesn't seem to be going anywhere when I pull it, and it's stayed on for a few journeys too. As it stands there is a bit of a low howl coming from the roof at approx 60mph. Although I expect some noise I'm hoping this is down to the empty mounting holes acting like pan pipes. Once the lamps are fitted the noise will hopefully disappear (and more hooefully not be replaced by more, different noise).
