I agree with you both. I definitely told myself to join those two tubes before putting the dash back in. For the pictures and just to start to get a vision of the progress, I had the magnets holding those tubes in. I haven't tacked anything but the base plates yet. That's why the dash bar pry doesn't look right because it's just resting up there on the factory wiring and what not. I will tack everything in shortly. I will definitely join the stock dash bar to the cage for sure. I hate the rattling and creaking sound that my dash has always made. Trying to eliminate or contain most of these rattling sounds. Speaking of which, I want to do the tack weld on the steering column trick, anyone know about that?