How about mating your body and pan this way?

[DORIGTT]

I am curious whether or not mounting the pan to the body without using the various bumpers and gaskets has been done in an effort to increase rigidity?

Porsche 911 bodys and the 356 (which in my humble opinion is very Beetle-like) have very good setup in the 'uni-body' arrangement. My goal is to create a much stiffer chassis by welding my pan and body together.

What do you gals and guys think?

I also intend to have a roll cage to protect myself from things like SUV drivers (not that all are bad, just the one's that never see or hear me and my bright yellow v-twin sport bike with an exhaust that makes so much noise that it feels like you're getting punched in the kidneys while idling), guard rails and off track excursions that try to get me to show my undersides.

Thanks in advance for any input/suggestion/thoughts.

Kevin J Hale