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Smash in the rain

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 9:24 am
by tomtom
This morning a guy drove out on a red light and stopped in front of my lane....I was going 70'ks an hour along the cumberland highway. Hit him about about 15-20ks an hour in a T bone. Im ok, so is he, but his car is probably a write off...mine, well the front is pretty bad.

Question, the air bag didnt deploy, was I going too slow?

Image

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 9:28 am
by The X
Yes, too slow for the bag to deploy.
looks like "minor" damange, new bonnet, bumper assembly, headlight(s), radiator and a few minor other things. :)

Good to hear you are safe.

What was his excuse for running a red?! I hope you called the cops to the scene, Guy should get docked for running a red and neg driving.
I know this rain is bad, but seems people juust drive with their head up their arse in the past week. Seriously the crazy stuff I have seen! *crazy*

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 9:32 am
by alextricity
happy to hear your safe =D

unlucky about the car though =(

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 9:33 am
by tomtom
VRX_Pete wrote:Yes, too slow for the bag to deploy. looks like minor damange, new bonnet, bumper assembly, headlight(s), radiator and a few minor other things. :) Good to hear you are safe. What was his excuse for running a red?! I hope you called the cops to the scene, Guy should get docked for running a red and neg driving. I know this rain is bad, but seems people juust drive with their head up their arse in the past week. Seriously the crazy stuff I have seen! *crazy*


He just said he thought it was green so he went across 2 lanes, noticed what he had done and stopped in mine. If it had been a dry day Im pretty sure I could have stopped. Sounded like he had just finished a night shift, so being tired and in the rain i guess he just made a really bad choice.

The driver side door has got a little bit of damage, was quite hard to open :( The headlights themselves look pretty good, the lenses are gone though

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 9:34 am
by Chubb
Airbags are typically inertially triggered, ie by the force of the crash and not speed. A good example might be your crash at 15kph, you hit the other cars door which would have crumbled absorbing some of the crash impact. If you were say to hit a solid wall at the same speed it is likely the airbags would deploy as the force of the impact would be greater since the wall has no give

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 9:38 am
by The X
tomtom wrote:Sounded like he had just finished a night shift, so being tired and in the rain i guess he just made a really bad choice. The driver side door has got a little bit of damage, was quite hard to open :( The headlights themselves look pretty good, the lenses are gone though

If he was smart enough, he'd keep his mouth shut and deny liability. his loss, your win, insurance wise. LOL.
I'd dare say your right fender is just pushing up against your door making it hard. Don't force it too much.

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 11:32 am
by sleeper
thanks for that explanation chubb, makes sense :)
i was about to say 70kph should be fast enough i would think, its not exactly slow.
glad your ok tomtom

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 11:47 am
by Hazy1
Sorry about the car. Atleast your all safe. There is alot of talk about airbags at the moment. There is a specific angle in which they activate anything outside of that and they dont deploy. I foudn this out when i maanged to rearend a getz and lift up to bonnet height.

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 11:50 am
by sleeper
scratch 1 hyundai :), good work cam.
thats worth 20,000 shop points

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 11:55 am
by Hazy1
I didnt scatch :P its a lunch box now :P should be life time membership :D

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 11:59 am
by Chubb
The shift in the mass of the car causes a circuit to close and trigger the sensor, which in turn triggers the airbags

Read more: How a Car Airbag Works | eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/how-does_4910145_ho ... z1SnMRMtlc


Alot of people have strange ideas about the mystery of airgbags, such as the inpact needs to hit a button like sensor, the impact needs to be on a certain angle, you need to be doing a certain speed and so on.

The fact of the matter as stated on the above website Airbags will deploy when the deaceleration of the car is over a programmed number of G's determined to be the point at which a human starts to suffer injuries. Airbags only deployed when they are absolutely needed as they do cause injury to occupants.

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 12:03 pm
by Hazy1
He is lucky they didnt go off. most places would right the car off becasue they are so expensive to reset.

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 3:15 pm
by Mizta B
Sorry to hear about this Thomas
Glad you are OK though, the car can always be repaired or replaced eh?
Take care mate and chin up, she will be good as new soon enough
I always have a spare seat if you can't make a cruise or whatever mate
Cheers Chris.... *yo*

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 3:51 pm
by Corzza2
Glad to hear you are ok. The airbag probably did not deploy because the impact was not strong enough to engage the airbag sensors which are found in various parts of the vehicle

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 4:22 pm
by Dire
Looks repairable to me :)
Best of luck in the insurance etc. Hope you don't run into any BS.

When my first car was written off, I still remember the pain of watching it lifted up onto the flatbed.
And then we left and ending up following the truck for a bit, agony :lol:

Its raining here too, I'll be extra careful now :)