Disclaimer: I have no intention (and nowhere near the welding skill or money required) to actually build my own frame.

Just wondering approximately how many feet of tubing are used to make an 818 frame? Also what is the size and wall thickness? I am guessing about 200ft of 2inch square tubing and maybe 1/16-1/8" thickness.

I am thinking about a project for a light-weighting class where I substitute materials (wall thickness spec'd for equivalent strength/stiffness) other than steel for the frame (eg stainless, or titanium for the cockpit/safety section and aluminum/bonded CF for the front and rear sections).For now I just want to get an estimate of the weight savings and material cost to see if it would even be interesting/remotely affordable to justify the design work. Safety considerations such as material fatigue don't matter at this point, just aiming for equivalent strength/stiffness.