In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :
Yes IT cars and so called so cars can still be had cheap; I see them for as little as $3500 and a bunch at the $5000-$6000 level.
I was at a vintage race and I guy was running a late 90s Celica (former School / Long Pro/Celeb car) he'd bought for 5K. Can't go wrong there.
General Note:
Make sure when you build a roll bar and/or cage - or rather have someone do it - that it is not only built to the sanctioning body specification, but that the individual who does it has previously built cages that have passed tech inspection. Some guy with a tubing bender and a welder (like say...me) isn't a cage fabrication specialist.
Have someone legitimately build you a cage that makes sense for what you're doing and want to do.
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If you're driving an airbag equipped car and wearing a full-face helmet, you should also be wearing a head and neck-restraint device. Unfortunately, that means you should be sitting in a car with a proper harness and seat and therefore should also have a proper roll-bar (minimum). The force generated from an airbag deployment can hit the chinbar of a full-face helmet with enough force to give you a severe neck injury. With a HANS (or similar) device, this cannot happen.
If your car isn't equipped with harnesses and/or roll-bar and has airbags active, wear an open face helmet. SCCA SOLO had a briefing on this nearly 20-years ago, advising local groups to have folks with airbags and no harnesses to not wear full-face helmets. And yet it seems to have gotten lost to the sands of time, because I see plenty of full-face helmets in autocross (I've done so myself as well).
When I ran SCCA Showroom Stock we had to remove the drivers airbag. It took all of 5 minutes in the Miata.
In reply to Tom1200 :
Tom doesn't Showroom Stock require/allow cages? Airbags definitely should be disabled in a caged car.
I decided to make up a little decision tree here for safety equipment in a broad sense:
There are HANS devices that work with factory 3 point belts. No need to disable airbags or only run an open faced helmet, you just need the right equipment.
In reply to docwyte :
You are correct. I have updated the tree to reflect that there are devices that you can use with 3-point belts (i.e., the Simpson Hybrid S).
In reply to RevolverRob :
This was the mid to late ninties and cages were required. I think they were worried about them deploying accidentally and blocking the drivers view.
5points get really really old in a daily driver. We had to put them in our NB after the double hoop was installed.
preach (fs) said:5points get really really old in a daily driver. We had to put them in our NB after the double hoop was installed.
IDK why it has to be a choice. My stage rally car (e30) has regular seatbelts (ironically, out of a Miata), as well as 6-point harness (w/HANS and halo seat). I use the seatbelt on the street, harness in competition.
I intend to go with a harness bar of some kind with HANS without additional roll protection. Because we really only have scattered anecdotes to go off of it's impossible to actually know what the safest answer is for each individual car. I've spent a bit of time searching for reports and images of how my specific car performs in a roll and I believe that the potential added safety on track is not worth the compromise in safety for myself and passengers for street driving; I believe that the roof is strong enough to protect me as well as a roll bar.
That said, if I were driving a 30 year old Civic (or similar vintage car), any convertible, or the vintage Mustang in the picture that clearly shows a lack of structural integrity my feelings would be different.
Irish I cannot quote at work but our NB had a bar from Boss Frog I think and it made the seatbelts inop. I would generally use the harness as a 3pt belt even though I know that it is a terrible idea.
I am kind of surprised that the Mustang pictured was able to fold like that. Clearly the bar was only attatched to the floor, and not on the sides anywhere. And it's a DAMN good thing they did NOT have harnesses, or the harness bar collapsing would have crushed their spines. (Well, in addition to the obvious)
(shameless plug) Stage rally cages are required to be welded/gusseted to the A-pillars and I think also the B-pillars for this reason, and there is also a lower side bar that is supposed to prevent stumps from smashing into the seats, but also works dandy as a way to keep the cage from punching through the floor. Also IIRC the seats are supposed to be mounted to the cage, not the floor. You're in a safety cage with a car around it, not a braced-up car.
Either way, "safety rules are written in blood"
More pictures of what happened to that Mustang...
http://thegarageblog.com/garage/it-seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time/#more-10656
That car wasn't just "rolled", it was flipped end over end when the front of the car bit into the ground as it came down from ramping over a tire barrier. I'm finding pictures of the same car out there from before it was wrecked and it has what appears to be Corbeau seats (not sure if fixed back or not) with harnesses.
http://www.mustangandfords.com/featured-vehicles/m5lp-0912-2010-mustang-gt-car-fx
More information I've gathered from searching the incident... the shop that did the work is at the track itself and it was the son of the owner of that shop who was driving, who has a reputation for being.... aggressive. The car was on the cover of a Mustang magazine, but I can't find the digital copy online and it's not 100% clear if the driver was wearing a harness or not.
Anyone wanna analys this?
For the cage in the Datsun we used an autopower kit and added tubes to make it a rally spec cage. Everything is 1.75 x .120 wall. The plates on the floor are 3/16ths thick and 5" x 8" to prevent the cage punching though the floor, the cage also has the sill bar (runs just below the lower edge of the door) which has mentioned further prevents the cage from punching though the floor.
This is total overkill in a 1600lb car but I'm willing to trade the extra 25lbs of tubing for a safer cage.
In reply to Tadope :
If you're referring to the links MrFancyPants posted. It boils down to a simple problem, arrogance. The folks who built that car, built a supercharged Coyote and 'stripped everything out to save weight', for a full-blown track car. In the process, they did not construct and fit a proper cage or even properly fit the roll bar that they did install. There is no excuse for such behavior, they are fortunate that everyone walked away from that crash and no one died or was severely injured.
The short moral of the story is there three places you never cut corners on a car: Safety Equipment, Brakes, Tires.
I'd rather deal with a blown up motor, a nuked gearbox, etc. Than deal with being in a wheelchair the rest of my life.
Many folks seem to think otherwise and I've seen cars with tens of thousands thrown into the engine with poorly built (or no) cages. Or poorly reinforced (or no reinforcement) for the cages installed. The whole thing has to be approached with caution.
A fairly well known import (Honda) drag racing crew had a catastrophic crash last year that ended with their driver in the hospital. They were driving a stock Honda chassis down into the 7-second range in the 1/4 mile. Upon reviewing the pictures of the car post-crash, it was clear to me that the cage and underlying chassis had not been properly reinforced for the car to go that fast. The floor pan gave way, resulting in the rear hoop collapsing. This particularly group bragged about racing the 'fastest stock chassis Honda' in the world. There is a reason why you shouldn't do such things. Honda never intended an EG Civic chassis to withstand an impact with a barrier wall at 180-mph. To do this, you need to properly build and reinforce the chassis and cage to tie them together. Fortunately, because this was a drag car that ran with a sanctioning body there were additional SFI-spec hoops over the driver (not used in road racing) that helped prevent more serious injury than a concussion and broken arm.
Arrogance and complacency are two things you cannot have when building and racing a vehicle.
People need to also think about if just breaking down and buying a used racecar rather than going thorough all of these half-measures would work better for them financially, time-wise and for safety reasons.
My "track day" RX7 has a bolt-in, 4-point roll bar, fixed-back fiberglass seats and 5-point harnesses. Even though the roll bar met all SCCA, NASA, etc. requirements I still had the body shop weld in some 1/4" thick plates that are tied into a major bulkhead for the feet of the main hoop. Not only did this allow me to position the main hoop in an ideal location/angle but it also will transfer some load into shear instead of completely normal in case of rollover.
I really don't drive this car on the street except for the occasional meet and tuning/diagnostics. I fully understand I'm taking a risk because even though my seat brackets are SFI/FIA approved there's always the possibility the mounts could fail causing my head to hit the roll bar in an impact. I have high density foam padding everywhere on the main hoop and cross brace but I know SFI-rated roll bar foam is not supposed to protect your bare head. In addition to a new SA2020 helmet two things I plan to add this off-season are proper seat back braces and a HANS device.
This thread is very sobering. I'm worried that my half cage isn't enough now and I'm already shopping for a fully caged car. Heck, maybe a tube frame chassis would be wise.
In reply to Cactus :
Remind me what car it is and what level you run it at? A full gage with all the gear is always best but the half cage may be good enough.
MrFancypants said:More pictures of what happened to that Mustang...
http://thegarageblog.com/garage/it-seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time/#more-10656
That car wasn't just "rolled", it was flipped end over end when the front of the car bit into the ground as it came down from ramping over a tire barrier. I'm finding pictures of the same car out there from before it was wrecked and it has what appears to be Corbeau seats (not sure if fixed back or not) with harnesses.
http://www.mustangandfords.com/featured-vehicles/m5lp-0912-2010-mustang-gt-car-fx
More information I've gathered from searching the incident... the shop that did the work is at the track itself and it was the son of the owner of that shop who was driving, who has a reputation for being.... aggressive. The car was on the cover of a Mustang magazine, but I can't find the digital copy online and it's not 100% clear if the driver was wearing a harness or not.
That shop was not known in Tulsa for doing "quality work."
They were the "overcharge guys that don't know much for shoddy work" shop.
In reply to infernosg :
I'm in a similar spot to you with my BMW E28. I built a 4-point rollbar for it that bolts in but rather than just through the floor and hope for the best there are proper plates at all 4 points welded into the structure of the car on two plains (and captive high grade nuts welded to them). With it I have two FIA approved fixed back seats and 6 point FIA approved harnesses (mounts to the roll bar at the proper height, the stock seatbelt mount on the B-pillar and extra mounts on the floor that are also plated and welded in). Lastly a HANS device to complete the package. It's an old car and Mosport is the fastest road course you can take a car on period so it only makes sense.
That setup is in the car for track days, the rest of the year it all comes out and the stock interior goes back in. It's not the most convenient setup but it allows me to have a cool old street car and a cool old track car. I don't have the space for a trailer and I don't want to daily drive something that could pull that trailer so the car still gets street driven to events.
To the OP, there's nothing wrong with starting out on the track with the full stock interior and safety package of the car, especially if that gives you the time/money to put a proper track safety system together for it down the road. It's a lot cheaper to do this right once.
Tom1200 said:In reply to RevolverRob :
This was the mid to late ninties and cages were required. I think they were worried about them deploying accidentally and blocking the drivers view.
It was 2004.
"It has been brought to the attention of SCCA Technical Services that the use of full-face or closed-face helmets while driving vehicles with active airbag restraint systems may result in injuries in the event of a crash that deploys the airbad. Because of the location of the steering wheel relative to the driver's position, the airbag axis is on a level with the driver's chin. In a crash with airbag deployment, contact with the chin area of a full face helmet can be so powerful "that the risk of fractures to the jaw cannot be ruled out" (Hubert Gramling, FIA Institute, FT3?AF, 18.5.1999). This applies to vehicles that may be used in Solo, RallyCross, High Performance Car Control Clinics, etc.
Therefore, it is highly recommended that full-face helmets not be used in vehicles with functional airbag systems. Potentially more restrictive language is currently being considered for 2005, which could appear in an early 2005 issue of FasTrack. If you have any questions, please contact the SCCA at 800.770.2055."
BUT! Then it was discovered that the study this was based on had some problems including the fact that it used an overpowered airbag in a formula car with a very reclined driving position. So the SCCA backed off on that directive which is why you haven't heard of it for years.
My silver M3 (pictured last page) had a bolt in bar. It was made by a BMW guy in Florida who made jigs to do E36 bars after making one for himself. I'd heard good things and the price was only a bit more than an AutoPower so I ordered one. Unlike a lot of pre-made ones, it came with floor plates bent to match the contour of the floor pan and also bolted to a stronger area right next to the rocker. With hefty backing plates I was pretty confident it wouldn't punch through the floor.
It did it's job admirably and was worth every cent I paid.
In reply to ddavidv :
That's Ben Sipson. I also got mine from him.
He should be in the forums, has a cool naked and caged BMW Z3 and is very talented.
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