Sean Korb wrote: > Well... I just looked at my Del Sol and the sticker on the door > doesn't have the gross weight on the door, in the manual or otherwise. > Maybe if the car is light enough it isn't required.
A GVWR is always required, but how and where it is stated might have some wiggle room. Sometimes the door sticker will state front and rear gross axle weights, or curb weight and max payload. The GVWR should be the sum of the front and read GAWR or sum of curb weight and max payload. > Maximum load is listed on the door and in the manual 400lbs for > passengers and their belongings. I weigh 230 and my brother weighs > 170 and our belongings... we have a penchant for cylinder heads, > transformers, alternators and other heavy things. We just call it my > Del Camino. > > I am pretty sure we're out of compliance. Probably ;^> Motor Trend has some GVWR info: <http://www.motortrend.com/cars/1997/honda/del_sol/specifications/exterior.html> For this example ('97 base model Del Sol), the curb weight is 1044kg (2301lb) and the GVWR is 1349kg (2974lb). The difference is 305kg (672lb), which should be the max payload (depending if the curb weight already includes a full tank of fuel, etc.). So, the fellow whose post-conversion Del Sol has a curb weight of 2600lbs will almost certainly be over GVWR when carrying a passenger or much payload besides the driver. Someone asked why worry about GVWR, and aside from the original topic which was possible donors for conversion to NEV/LSV (which requires that the GVWR is under 3000lb, though it is not at all clear that one can register a conversion as a NEV/LSV regardless of GVWR... check the laws where you live before starting such a project), the other reason for concern is that your insurance company can, and most likely will, deny your coverage if you are involved in an accident and they discover your vehicle was over its GVWR at the time. The situation is more hopeful for lithium conversions, but many of those using lead-acid packs are at or over GVWR before the driver gets in. One 'trick' you can use, should you find your conversion is uncomfortably near to its GVWR is to remove one or more of the original seatbelts. Confirm the law where you live, but typically the GVWR is based on a payload allowance of 50kg (110lb) or 75kg (165lb) (I think it is 75kg, but can't recall for sure offhand) per seatbelt. You can't remove the driver's seatbelt ;^>, but if you've converted a car with a back seat, you can regain some of the payload capacity lost during conversion due to curb weight increase by removing one or more of the unneeded seatbelts. (Solectria did this on the 4-door Metro, removing one of the rear seatbelts and activating the child lock feature on the door next to the seat position without a seatbelt. The premise is that although a full rear seat remained, the car was legally now only a 3-seater and so the payload allowance was reduced sufficiently to allow the vehicle to operate within its GVWR despite a higher than original curb weight.) Cheers, Roger. _______________________________________________ UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org For EV drag racing discussion, please use NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA)
