How-To: DIY Fire Extinguisher Mount
 

Procrastination fostered innovation. Last year I found myself just a week before a track event needing to get my tech inspection done. This was to be the second event with an area PCA chapter and that meant that the grace period for certain equipment was over... second event meant all the rules applied. I needed to mount a fire extinguisher in the car to meet regs.

Club rules state that the extinguisher had to be within reach of the driver and my rules included that the installation must not require permanent mods to the car. I know Brey-Krause offer an extinguisher mount for the Boxster that fits to the underside of the seat. For me, this had two big downsides:

1. I had not ordered that part yet and was out of time.:rolleyes:
2. It required removal of the seat to mount it. Even if I had the time this seemed like more work than necessary.

So time for some shade tree design... noted that the seat came with some handy holes and openings I could use to my advantage. Measured and modeled something with some cardboard that fit the bill...

Here's what resulted. At work we happened to have some pieces of galvanized sheet metal that came in as shipping braces on a computer rack enclosure... taking advantage of that ready stock, all that was left was some hacksaw work and some bending and drilling to get to this. Locknuts and socket cap screws secure the plate to the seat through the existing holes. Ended up with just holes instead of slots in the plate for the screws and with luck it aligned perfectly. The bracket came with the Halotron (Halon replacement) fire extinguisher, it mounts to the plate with locknuts and screws.

Now all assembled... the extinguisher falls readily to hand but is as far out of the way as possible for ingress/egress. The whole assembly rides along with the seat and doesn't cause any restrictions. Tech inspector was tickled with the result.

Of course, after working up a sweat cutting, drilling and bending both the metal and yourself doing the installation... you deserve a...

Hi,

Good Job! I did the Brey-Krause mount and pulling the seat was very easy, so for anyone either not handy or having access to the right materials, go with the Brey-Krause.

Donv - I especially like how carefully and securely you attached the bracket to the raw stock. Don't want a break-away ankle shattering missile in a collision...

Happy Motoring!... Jim'99

Can you post some pics?