Kit Cobra loses it at Willow at 130mph......video

[kaisen]

Ouch!! I can't believe he walked away from this

[bivenator]

Wow.

[Joe Bob]

Serious lack of safety equipment.....wanker.

[notfarnow]

wow, LUCKY. 130mph is a bit fast for my tastes in a car without headrests or a roll cage (or even a roof). The roll bar probably saved him, but it doesn't strike me as a whole lot of protection for those speeds.

[willtel]

Ouch. I love the for sale ads for the engine and trans leading into the video.

I wonder if that will be his last track day.

[asphaltgambler]

wonder what initially broke?? - appeared that he was going down the straights flat and level ??

[onewhippedpuppy]

I don't think lucky sufficiently describes the situation. Wow.

[romad]

something broke looks like he was putting in full left lock as it departed stage right.

[ODDJOB UNO]

Originally Posted by Joe Bob

Serious lack of safety equipment.....wanker.

ser-i-azz lack of maint. double/triple WANKER!



are those kit cars now selling PLASTIC suspension parts????????????????



mmmmmm.......................i want a kit car............................NOT!

[MJHanna]

He is lucky he still has his hands, He had no arm restrains if you watch the slow motion his arm is stretched out trying to “hold the car as he goes over”

[LeeH]

When it's not your time, it's simply not your time. He easly could have been in as many parts as the car was after that roll.

[sammyg2]

Rear suspension broke, looks like a trailing control arm let go:



Different cobra kits use different suspension parts. Lots of the lower end kits are designed to use either moostang II or 80's moostang 5 liter front ends and suspension. Not really up to anything more than spirited highway driving.

That one looks like a backdraft kit, they supposedly use "custom" suspension designed for racing. I'm not familiar enough with it to tell if that's a furd product or if it's really custom made but you can clearly identify the broken part from this pic:



The Superformance and other top end kits use high performance suspension parts that are very close to real race car stuff. that's why the cars cost twice as much.
Iffn you are going to get a cheap kit, keep it off a high speed track.
If you are going to track it, spend the extra 25 gees and get the superformance or similar.

[sammyg2]

As a comparison to that stamped crap, here are some pics of the superformance suspension (that comes fully assembled from the factory).
They sell turn-key minus drivetrain cars only.






Which system would you trust more at 130 mph?

[nostatic]

Originally Posted by Joe Bob

Serious lack of safety equipment.....wanker.

No arm tethers, no HANS, no cage.

But he put a bunch of money into the engine and transmission. Some good choices made there...

[kach22i]

Scary stuff.

[speeder]

Yep, that's catastrophic equipment failure right there. He's lucky he wasn't killed, he just used-up one of his nine lives.

There is no substitute for doing your own strict tech sessions including really looking for cracks in stressed suspension components. It's also an argument for choosing the right weapon in the first place for a street/track car. Porsches tend to get the most respect at Willow for not breaking on track days. To be fair, they still break sometimes but it's rare and usually the fault of owner modifications or really improper maintenance. A couple of other really strong track cars seem to be Corvette Z-06s and Vipers, actually.

The above is strictly my non-scientific observations from track days but I've seen plenty of broken cars at Willow. BMWs seem to break or explode like crazy, as well as WRXs and other Japanese cars that were really not designed for the race track.

[willtel]

Originally Posted by sammyg2

Rear suspension broke, looks like a trailing control arm let go:

Lubey should be able to tell us why that failed.

By the way Lubey, if you make a book series about suspension failures in replica kit cars I want royalties.

[sammyg2]

SOMETIMES guys buy wrecked moostangs out of the junkyard for parts to build up a cobra kit car, that pic above should be a good reason not to.

EDIT: I did a bunch O'checking to see if I could ID that broken suspension part as an OEM ford part, but now it's looking more and more like it's off a BMW!

Any beamer experts out there recognize it?

I'd ask Wayne but he's busy with his new book, 101 projects for your busticated cobra kit car.

[VincentVega]

Here is an e36 rear suspension

[sammyg2]

GOT IT! 92 thru 05 beamer 3 series.
POS gerrman crap, they shoulda engineered it to last forever and take 500 hp!



Kinda makes you wonder about backdraft cobra kit cars and their "custom" suspension.