ClubCJ - The CJ Lancer Club

Hey guys,

I'm just absolutely devasted at my stupidity today
Ive only had the car for 3 months and i already crashed it.

Basicly it was raining in syd today, all i did was try to turn right at an intersection, i didn't think i was going fast at all. Before I know it, the car is massively understeering and im heading straight for a pole and a pedestrian curb. Luckily I missed the pole completely but mounted the curb reall badly, car jumped on the curb came back down and then hit the curb again before finally i gained some steering cabability and it allowed me to get back on the road.

I was in absolute shock, so i drove (with great difficulty) to a corner side street and pulled over. I was expecting extensive damage. The front left had side of the front bomper near the wheel well was hanging off, the left tire and rim where badly damaged. my front right tire was deflated and facing outwards - my wheel alignment was severly off. I had to call a tow truck and they have got it at some assesment center now.

Im barely coming to terms with what happened as ive never been in an accident before.

So just a word to everyone out there...be very careful when taking corners in wet weather. Even though they tell you your car has so and so technology at the end physics always wins.

My other issue now and im hoping the expierience from you guys will assist with this.
What smash repaier should i take it to ? Can anyone recommend anyone good that delas withs these kind of cars. Becasue there are a number of things im worried about like;
The diff and transmission.
The fact that if you change one tire you have to change all of them (according to the manual)

and mainly someone that understands how these cars work and will look at everything that could have been effected rather that what they can just see.
Any recomendations around the sydney area would be highly appreciated.

Thanks guys.

Sincerly,

Jay

Sorry to hear mate good luck with the repairs and hope it doesn't take too long!

Jeez that sucks man. Did you have your ASC turned off?

Im not sure if the same rule applies but in regards to the tire, the wheels on the same axle must be of the same tire. IE front tires have to be the same as eachother and the rears have to be the same as eachother.

I know that applies to standard RWD or FWD but im not 100% sure about AWD.

Depending on how bad the alignment might be out, you might have done some damage to your CV joint...

Sorry to hear you had an accident.

The main thing is you are okay apart from your pride.

I can not recommend anyone but I can tell you check with your insurance company. They often have clauses in your policy that it can only go to recommended repairers.

Take plenty of pictures of the damage and keep an eye on the car when it is getting repaired to check that it is all repaired.

Yes you will need 4 new tyres. Make sure the insurance company replaces all of them.

jay sorry to here mate badluck for 2011 i am sure the car will get fixed without any hiccups mate

thats true matt i did the same thing 4 months back at a really tight round about aswell no damage either just the silly embarrasment which was going through the head

Sorry to hear of all your collective screw ups. No matter how much technology you have in a car, drive to the conditions. I know a bit too late. I learnt the hard way when writting off my dad's VL commodore in severe wet weather and not at the time with my limited experience just off my P's, what I thought was the driving to the conditons, was not in fact "Driving to the conditions".

At least you're okay with no whiplash or stiffness. A car is repairable and replacable, you are not. simple.

Off my high horse now....

As for repairs, depends on your insurer and how much flexibility they allow in nominating your own repairer.

I'm sure the good community we have here, can offer some suggestions on good repairers.

Best of luck, just count yourself lucky you're not severely injured or dead, your loss of pride will heal in time. We all screw up as part of our learning experience. As long as you learn from this, and become a better driver from this, it's all good then. Right?

sorry to hear about that! hope it gets fixed! are you on insurance? if so then you wont have to pay load of money to fix it maybe you would give $300 to the insurance excess thing best of luck jay!

poor bugger!!! bad start to 2011 - good luck mate

sh!t i know how you feel mate, it sucks but this is why we have insurance it will all work out for you

Thanks for all the support and advice guys,

Its good to talk to people who understand and / or have been in similar situations.

Still ahven't come quite to terms with what happened yesterday but im getting there.

Im still researching which smash repairer i should take it to.

billy boy wrote:Sorry to hear mate good luck with the repairs and hope it doesn't take too long!

Thanks man.

tadz0rz wrote:Jeez that sucks man. Did you have your ASC turned off?

Im not sure if the same rule applies but in regards to the tire, the wheels on the same axle must be of the same tire. IE front tires have to be the same as eachother and the rears have to be the same as eachother.

I know that applies to standard RWD or FWD but im not 100% sure about AWD.

Depending on how bad the alignment might be out, you might have done some damage to your CV joint...

Yeah the ASC was left on, i never turn it off really. Only thing different was that I had it on Gravel rather than Tarmac coz of the Wet conditions.

Yeah you may be right, judging by how the tires where sitting (both of them facing outwards) that may have been damaged also.

aspir3 wrote:Sorry to hear you had an accident.

The main thing is you are okay apart from your pride.

I can not recommend anyone but I can tell you check with your insurance company. They often have clauses in your policy that it can only go to recommended repairers.

Take plenty of pictures of the damage and keep an eye on the car when it is getting repaired to check that it is all repaired.

Yes you will need 4 new tyres. Make sure the insurance company replaces all of them.

Thanks man, yeah I am extermly greatful, no other vechile or person was involved as it would have made it 100 times worse.

Im with NRMA, i know they have a choose your repairer policy and they asked me when i made the claim who I wanted and i told them ill get back to them so i can do some research.

At the time of the accident i only took 1 picture as i was still in shock about it, but i may goto the nominated repairer before they start the repiars and get some pics taken.

Yeah i thought so about the tires, ill definaetly ask them as well.

Mitch wrote:jay sorry to here mate badluck for 2011 i am sure the car will get fixed without any hiccups mate

Thanks man, i hope so

Mattigins wrote:ah sorry to hear.. i did the same thing the other day around a round a bout in the wet.. was sliding straight towards a pole.. stopped a few inches away.. luckily no damage except embarrassment..

ASC tries to help by cutting power to the wheels but once your sliding you cant stop until you hit something or regain traction.

Yeah same thing happened, as i was slidding i was thinking "OK stop already" but it just kep sliding and sliding until it made impact. Your lucky man.

VRX_Pete wrote:Sorry to hear of all your collective screw ups. No matter how much technology you have in a car, drive to the conditions. I know a bit too late. I learnt the hard way when writting off my dad's VL commodore in severe wet weather and not at the time with my limited experience just off my P's, what I thought was the driving to the conditons, was not in fact "Driving to the conditions".

At least you're okay with no whiplash or stiffness. A car is repairable and replacable, you are not. simple.

Off my high horse now....

As for repairs, depends on your insurer and how much flexibility they allow in nominating your own repairer.

I'm sure the good community we have here, can offer some suggestions on good repairers.

Best of luck, just count yourself lucky you're not severely injured or dead, your loss of pride will heal in time. We all screw up as part of our learning experience. As long as you learn from this, and become a better driver from this, it's all good then. Right?

Yep deffinately a learning expierience, an expensive one unfortunately. I am deffinately greatful that I didn't sustain any personal injuries but at the same time really disspointed at what happened.

I can deffinately say that my driving style is going to change from now on.

evo9990 wrote:sorry to hear about that! hope it gets fixed! are you on insurance? if so then you wont have to pay load of money to fix it maybe you would give $300 to the insurance excess thing best of luck jay!

Thanks man, I wish my excess was only $300, more like $3000 but dosn't matter, if it means the car will be repaired its worth it, just glad I had insurance.

13EZY wrote:poor bugger!!! bad start to 2011 - good luck mate

Thanks mate, I know ey, what a way to start 2011.

driftnut(( wrote:sh!t i know how you feel mate, it sucks but this is why we have insurance it will all work out for you

Thanks man, yeah deffinatley glad insurance exsists, otherwise would have been 10 times worse.

I'll keep you guys posted on which repaire I end up going to and whats happening with the car / repiar to add more information to this knowledge base if anyone finds they may need it in the future.

But yeah thanks again for all your support and advic guys, much appreaciated.

regards,

Jay

take it easy on those wet corners mate , stock advans are really bad on wet surface , hopefully the insurance claim goes all well and fast

Let us know if you need any help , good luck !

PYLee wrote:take it easy on those wet corners mate , stock advans are really bad on wet surface

They're not great in the dry either.....
Hope everything works out well.

Did anything flash up on your screen on your impacts and once the car had stopped? If nothing came up then apart from a some new wheels/tyres, wheel alignment and re-attaching the front bar is about as much damage that has been done. Might be a little bit of brake assembly/suspension tower damage but these things if anything major happened it will flash up on your screen.

Apart from hitting the gutter pretty hard and the scare from it there doesnt seem to be much damage. Let your insurance company sort all the details out, if you dont nominate a repairer they will use one of theirs. That part is all taken care of when you go to get the car assessed.