That padding will do pretty much NOTHING when your un-helmeted head hits it in an accident. I'm not gonna pee in the wind and force my experience on anyone but being around many of the people i have and seeing what they have done and the decisions they have made, I would not do it on an excursion. Many people i know have tens of thousands of dollars into their cars in mods, not including the cars, and of the few caged up, are wearing helmets in most cases. On a limited use race car yes, a daily driver SUV no. All your doing is giving up the guilitein for a .45 to the head.

 

I still disagree to a point, there is plenty of other things in an excursion to split your domepiece. I was in the race scene for years before I decided to get married recently and I have seen people roll their cars with a lightly padded cage (on the straat w/no helmet)walk away from it and later say "good thing I invested in a roll cage". I'm sure 5 pt harnesses are smart to enforce the chance of flying out of your seat. But I know there are ways to make it safer for a daily driver if you have the time and money. It's not a whole lot different than saying the roof or any other hard part of the X can split your head open, because it can.

And I am not talking about pillow stuffing for your cage, There is actual roll cage padding that is made for the street racer/daily driver that will help save your head.

 

Buy another vehicle... Seriously. You're taking the events of one crash and assuming that this can/ will happen to you. You're also singling out one potential scenario out of thousands to protect yourself from. The line of logic that got you here just doesn't seem all that realistic. The plain truth is that just about any vehicle can experience a roof collapse if the conditions are right.

Spend your money on learning high speed evasive driving manuevers and don't try to protect yourself from a scenario you'll most likely never find yourself in.

Just my .02 as always.

 

being somebody that has an excursion, a suburban and 2 off-road/rockcrawlers, I can say this....there are SUV's and there are vehicles that NEED a cage...the X is not going to be one of them, the amount of tubing, labor and the space that will be chewed up would make this a HUGE undertaking...
There is NO way to make a safe cage that will not kill your interior space.PERIOD
in order to properly triangulate/design the cage for a vehicle with a wheelbase this size would require mounting to the frame(cutting holes in floor which will never give you a proper seal due to body/chassis flex) plus the fact you will need at least 2 crossbraces running from side to side within the interior of the X as well(behind each set of seats)
factor in the high price of tubing, labor, design, and all that good stuff, you're looking at several thousand bucks for a cage you will prob never need as long as you realize and drive the thing like the almost 4 ton rig it is.....
I don't wanna down your idea...just being realistic

 

yeah that sounds kool ( said as if i were high on air ) but just imagine what an outside cage would look like .....mmmmmmmmmmmm outside cagggggeeeee ( said like homer simpson) you know i almost had one made by a friend who makes roll cages but i didnt have enough time to have it done as i had to move to another state "on orders" but i did have a pic / drawing ill see if i can find it when i get all my household goods

 

I personally am not worried too much about it, just giving my 2 cents to the firefighter who posted the thread. An outside cage would be the ultimate off-road protection though! Just respect your 8000lb beast on sharp turns and such!

 

Fro my 2 cents. I have had my X for almost 8 years and have never even felt it lean so much that I would roll. I live in a very deer populated area and have had several situations in which I have had to swerve quickly. I also live in NJ with a lot of nut drivers on 287 every day. I have swerved many times and never felt not safe. The key factor here is speed. X's may go above 100mh ( excluding stock diesels) but that does not mean it needs to be driven that way. Just as DGAFTP put it respect what you drive and you ost likely will not have issues. IF something was to happen I personaly feel very safe in my X being I am up higher and weigh a lot more than most vehicles. Drive safe and save lives.

 

roll cage plus non-helmeted head = major ouch or death. I've bonked my head more time than I can count on my race car's cage ON THE SFI padding and it still hurts. That's just getting something out of it or working on it. God forbid at an impact force.

Also agree it would be incredibly difficult to make a worthwhile cage/bar due to the length of the vehicle and the desire to keep 3 rows safe as opposed to one row oor one seat like in a race car. Not to mention the danger of the 2nd row passengers hitting the cross bar on the front seat. It would kill them.

As to the roof structure helping somewhat.....you saw a crushed roof after a rollover, right? Obviously it did NOT help near enough. That said, most cars and trucks DO crumble in rollovers. You'll nearly always find A pillars crushed down. I don't feel any production vehicles are really safe in rollovers.

 

NJ, since you're Diesel I'm going to go out really far on a limb and ASSume you have a lower stance rear wheel drive Ex. The driveability between the 4wd vehicles and the 2wd I find to be significant because of the lower stance of the 4x2 models (lower center of gravity).

I can get into my 2wd F150 and I can't imagine any situation that could cause that truck to roll over while I've been in 4x4 F150s that seem a lot less agile.

 

here is what got me started in an outside rollcage but a roof rack would sufice Check out this X on Ebay http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Ford... 0503037QQrdZ1
hope the link works

 

Mike no I am 4x4. I did not think they made 4x2 diesle x's. Possibly but why have a diesle and not 4x4x?

 

i got a 7.3 beast of a deisel and its 2wd but it rolls on 4 wheels ;0)

 

on saturday 7-21-12 my wife and 5 kids were headed to soft ball and blew a stear tire pulled them off the road and up a hill then rolled twice the front of the cab was crushed down to the dash and seats it would be a good idea to at least reinforce the windshield suport uprites and i itend to get another one and i would like to put an internal cage in bye build it i dont care any ideas would help