Organic Racing car out of action

[WestTexasS2K]

Well it finally happened. Kevin had my car at Panoz track day at Road Atlanta whopping some serious GT3 and corvette Zo6 butts. They moved a car up from the group B class to Group A the faster class. The guy was in a vette and waved Kevin by on the left side the vette was offline. So as Kevin begins to pass the guy with about a 20 mph surplus the guy pulls back online right in front of Kevin. Kevin got on the brakes hard and barely misses rear ending the guy. The guy see Kevin on his ass and panics and slams on his brakes. Kevin swerves to miss him and spins into a cement wall with the back of the car. Good news is the wall didnt touch the body at all. The bad news is the trailer hitch hit the wall hard in the spin. The Trailer hitch happens to be very stoute and is tied to the rear frame structure. As it hit the wall in a spinning motion it hit with enough force bend the rear frame section over about 2" and wrinkled all the rear metal. I havent seen pics yet so I dont know how much to cry but it looks like Run and Gun is going to be a tough to make but we will give it a good try rest assured. It looks like we may have to replace the whole chassis which means basicly building a whole car all over again. Paint, wiring interior flush mount tail lights and transfering all the mechanicals interior etc. So we will see.:ack:

[slngsht]

damn. sorry to hear. Sounds like Kevin is OK. Car is replaceable

[WestTexasS2K]

Oh yeah Kevin was fine. A little miffed at the guy though for not following the rules. The vette driver couldn't be found after the session. Probably a good thing.

[slngsht]

I can't understand why the guy hit the brakes after he saw Kevin brake check?

[WestTexasS2K]

I think he was a little green on the track just moved up to the faster group and probably his street instinicts kicked in and not his racing instincts. Sure makes me wish I would have gotten that track insurance that I just turned down last month, 600.00 would be cheap right now.

[slngsht]

$600 does sound cheap... where?

is that per event?

[R1 Seven]

Really sorry to hear this. Glad to hear that Kevin is ok though. I was in close proximity to some jackassery at Summit Point just last month. Sad to say that on track, it is not if something will happen, but when. Everybody's number comes up at some point. That is why I prepped my car with the extra safety gear.

 

I am sure you guys will get it all patched up and as good as new real soon. If you guys can change like six rear ends on the road...this should be cake.

 

Good luck!

[WestTexasS2K]

They had an advert on the 1 lap site. They cover cars that are used on the track. I believe that the 600.00 was for 1 year but it didnt cover the car on the street just track use. But it was an agreed value coverage. You can contact and fill out the application it takes about 2 weeks to get a quote. I think that it is a resonable rate just didnt have the money at the time. If they would cover the car for normal use then i would be all over it for that price. Contact Brett Ross at 630 215 5257 with Everitt Boles Ltd they are based in London but he is the U.S agent.

 

 

For some reason none of my link attachments seem to work. They attach but when you try to go to the link it is not there. Any ideas? http://www.onelapofamerica.com/whatsNew/index.shtml?0121

[slngsht]

heck, as long as they're OK with it being registered on the street - and just not cover it on the street, that is ONE HECK OF A DEAL for track insurance.

 

It doesn't take much to do $600 in damages.

 

Thanks for the lead.

[locostv8]

You would be surprised what a good technician can pull with a frame machine. I would check that before building a new car. Alternately check with the vendor to see if they would supply a rear clip from the bulkhead back.

[solder_guy]

At ToTD Kevin talked about how much he loves Road Atlanta .. maybe not as much now ..

 

This reminds me how much I get po'd when people hit the brakes while driving on the interstate highways .. totally unnecessary.

 

I hope you get the car back together soon!

 

Rob

 

[Kitcat]

At evey track day drivers' meeting I remind folks not to tailgate because the rookie drivers often don't react by pulling over but, instead, by standing on the brakes, tho it makes absolutely no sense. I also remind all that IF someone is on your butt, the last thing you want to do is stop. I know yours wasn't a tailgate situation, just an idiot drive doing the unexpected, but the driver error is the same.

 

I also mention that a black flag does not mean stop instantly in the middle of the track. All of these circumstances have produced some intersting on-track moments for me, fortunately, no contact.

[SR27.Seth]

Smashing a car sucks, but in racing it's inevitable, it hurts even more for guys like us that drive our streetable cars on the track. This is why we are going to build a race only car with quick frame and body repairs in mind.

 

In my experience of repairing bent frames on thin tubed steel chassis cars- it is much easier to remove all the body work, start cutting off as far back (or in this case forward) as the damaged pieces go- then weld in new tubular sections- if the damage did not effect the diff mounting or rear suspension mounting (check the alignment of the entire car before you pull anything apart!) then the job is quite easy- just cosmetic really.

I wish Kevin lived closer- I'd love to help out so I could be sure to see you at the Fireball and Run N' Gun.

[WestTexasS2K]

Kevin sent some pics last night but it is a little hard to see but I think we car just remove the rear skin, cut a few of the damaged tubes out and rebuild it that way. The top rear hoop where the cover attaches looks good but the bottom one is bent and broken and the rear diff mount area is bent pretty well. It bent a few suspension pieces too. But I think we can patch her back good as new without a complete new chassis.

[slngsht]