> What seat belts do you recommend for my 1966 MGB?
David,
I bought the Moss 3-point belts for my '67 and they didn't work very well.
Because the anchorage for the shoulder belt is designed to hang vertically
from the B pillar in "normal" application, it doesn't work well when
attached to the belt anchorage on the inside of the wheel arch. The belt
material slowly slips out of the holder making the shoulder strap looser and
looser. I found that after pulling it tight, it took only two or three
minutes of driving until the shoulder strap had become too loose.
I've looked into this and it appears that all after market seatbelts come
from the same manufacturer. Everyone I have looked into supply exactly the
same 3-point belt.
Looking into information from Sparco and Simpson, it appears that the
anchorage point for the MGB shoulder belt is in a very bad place. Because
the anchor point is much, much lower than the top of the users shoulder, in
an accident the forces pull down on the shoulder making a bad injury much
more likely. No performance belt supplier will allow the anchorage point of
their shoulder belt to be below the level of the user's shoulder. Lots of
mfgrs. make belt bars that go in cars like Porsches, BMWs, Mitsu Evos, Subie
WRXs, etc, etc. I wonder if someone has ever designed a shoulder belt anchor
bar for MGBs that don't have a roll bar? Hmmm...
I used to try to find original Kangol Magnetic belts for MGBs I was
restoring until I read a study on the deterioration of seat belt material
when exposed to sunlight. The stuff looses over half of it's strength after
only 5 years exposure. Yikes!
Safety Fast!
--
Rod Williams
Petaluma, California
1967 MGB
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