Style bar VS Roll bar

[Tedsmx5]

"So when a car goes into the hills it just wants to flip over onto it's lid?
You would still have to drive like a complete lunatic to put any car on it's roof."

So you’ve not been on a run lead by Stephen aka “Kuntry Kuzzin” then
Ted

[StanTheMan]

at the end of the day its not nececaryly what you do which is the problem. when you are going hard around a corner & another car or motorbike is where its not supposed to be and hits you......its quite easy to land on your roof or end up in a dictch which can also make you roll it reasonably easy.

its certainly has a low chance of happening.....yes there is always calculated risks involved when you are going hard......for most of us the calculated risk does not always include another stupid driver doing the same stupid things we are doing , except going the opposite direction.

[Tedsmx5]

at the end of the day its not nececaryly what you do which is the problem. when you are going hard around a corner & another car or motorbike is where its not supposed to be and hits you......its quite easy to land on your roof or end up in a dictch which can also make you roll it reasonably easy.

its certainly has a low chance of happening.....yes there is always calculated risks involved when you are going hard......for most of us the calculated risk does not always include another stupid driver doing the same stupid things we are doing , except going the opposite direction.

So you’ve not been on a run lead by Stephen aka “Kuntry Kuzzin” then!
Ted

Yes Stan I agree it does worry me sometimes when I'm on a run and a Holden ute decides he can out drive these rice burners double unbroken lines are for other drivers.

[sliq]

hrmm, i've always been worried with flipping my mx5 if i go down to wakefield.

how often does that occur?

[Benny]

Everyone carries on about the very low number of crashes that actually involve a car rolling over, but once you leave the flat streets of the suburbs and head out into the hills, things are different.

So when a car goes into the hills it just wants to flip over onto it's lid?
You would still have to drive like a complete lunatic to put any car on it's roof.

Large 4WD's are very easy to turn turtle.
Didn't you see the 5th Gear episode where they got a Range Rover (one of the better 4WD's) and drove it at 45mph (about 75 clicks) then hit the brake sand swerved?
It instantly rolled onto its side and played Roll Over Rover.
That's why 4WD's are dynamically speaking, the most unsafe passenger vehicles.

The mouse trap shot is interesting, but not knowing anything about it, it could have been the tow truck driver that did it while pulling the car, upside down, onto the truck.
I've seen a number of photos of MX-5 that have rolled and their style bars (RB's mainly) are the only thing still standing.
Obviously having a diagonal bar and extra mounting points will make them stronger, as in a proper roll bar, but mounting something on the piss-weak parcel shelf may not add a lot of extra strength.
The weakest part, and the part we should worry about, is the windscreen as they always collapse when rolled.

[Speedyblue]

Large 4wd's are also easy to run wide through corners, especially if you aren't paying attention. The 4wd that caused the crash in front of my GF didn't even stop, just kept going, so they were probably drunk (this happened mid week at 6pm) Every day I drive around a number of corners where the bank drops away sharply and there is no guard rail. Maybe a dirt drain at best. If I got shunted buy another car, a rollbar might not save me, but at least it gives me a chance. After I get out of the hills, there is pretty much zero chance of flipping unless something very stupid goes down.

When I go on night drives for fun, almost every corner drops off steeply from the road

[RobH]

I had an original Racing Beat Type II style bar (not a copy) in my car for 12 months and was impressed with the quality and strength of it. While it is no roll bar, the way it connected to the car through the seat belt towers and the how rigid it was still gave an extra feeling of safety as I believe it would have helped in the event of a roll over. I replaced it with a BD because I started doing more track days and this was more suitable to that environment.

I agree with Benny, a larger concern is how easily the windscreen surrounds seem to flatten out.

[JBT]

.........it could have been the tow truck driver that did it while pulling the car, upside down, onto the truck.

That's exactly what it looks like to me too Benny. Look how the windscreen frame is also pulled up and forward. Or maybe it was going backwards when inverted.

[Old Dude]

[

So when a car goes into the hills it just wants to flip over onto it's lid?
You would still have to drive like a complete lunatic to put any car on it's roof.

[/quote]

Sorry Bruce but I was driving back from NSW south coast in the rain, came over the bridge at Kiama, and the fireies were there putting sand on some oil that was all over the bridge. We turned off to go through Kangaroo Valley and I was following a holden panel van that had came the same way,we were both doing the speed limit on a straight piece of undulating road, as the van hit the undulations it started to twist sideways (due to the oil) next minute he was side ways and on his roof and ended up in the ditch on the side of the road.
At thats same time I noticed my car was also doing a little dance, so I backed of and drove the rest of the way extremely cautiously, the oil stayed until we hit some dry road and then all was OK.
So you don't have to be driving like a complete Lunatic to roll, it can just be unlucky curcumstances that you find yourself in.
Cheers
Old Dude

[Old Dude]

Here is a picture of a rolled MX 5 in America, don't know what type of bar it was but apparently it saved his life.

gomiata_2047_62125307.jpg

Cheers
Old Dude

[hks_kansei]

don't know what type of bar it was but apparently it saved his life

"Hard Dog" I beleive is the brand of that one. from what I gather, quite popular in the USA.


edit:
here's their site, and more crash pics:
http://www.bethania-garage.com/testimonials.htm

[Benny]

[

So when a car goes into the hills it just wants to flip over onto it's lid?
You would still have to drive like a complete lunatic to put any car on it's roof.

Sorry Bruce but I was driving back from NSW south coast in the rain, came over the bridge at Kiama, and the fireies were there putting sand on some oil that was all over the bridge. We turned off to go through Kangaroo Valley and I was following a holden panel van that had came the same way,we were both doing the speed limit on a straight piece of undulating road, as the vans car hit the undulations it started to twist sideways (due to the oil) next minute he was side ways and on his roof and ended up in the ditch on the side of the road.
At thats same time I noticed my car was also doing a little dance, so I backed of and drove the rest of the way extremely cautiously, the oil stayed until we hit some dry road and then all was OK.
So you don't have to be driving like a complete Lunatic to roll, it can just be unlucky curcumstances that you find yourself in.
Cheers
Old Dude [/quote]


I know what you're talking about there Old Dude.
I too rolled a car when only doing about 40km/h.
It was in a brand new Torana that Mrs Benny and I rented in Tasmania about 30 odd years ago.
Here I was minding my own business on this nice dirt road, playing rally driver and hanging the tail out, when I hit a rock with a rear wheel, which ripped part of the tyre off and the car went very gently onto its side.
It all happened so slowly that I was really surprised that the car went over.

The side of the car was stoved in, but still driveable.
We drove the car back to Hobart to the rental agency, and I went in and said I'd like to exchange the car, as I didn't like the look of it anymore.
The guy behind the counter gave me a very strange look, so I suggested he go outside and have a look at it.
You should have seen his face drop when he saw the car.
When I picked it up it only had 37k's on the clock!

[marcusus]

hrmm, i've always been worried with flipping my mx5 if i go down to wakefield.

how often does that occur?

Incredibly unlikely. I usually have the most spectacular off's of the day (if not, at least top 3 ) when I go down and I haven't come close to rolling it.

It can definitely happen if you really come off at a weird angle and get really unlucky with the ground, but in all the club track days I've been too, the worst I've seen on a '5 is just a new layer of dust, or perhaps a load of mud caught in certain bits of the car.

[sliq]

thanks for that marcus.

[greenMachine]

There was a thread here some years ago (old board?), and my memory says that it involved a (club?) run up the far north coast, MX5 hit a slippery patch (damp road, overhanging trees, oil from trees on road etc), car slid into roadside embankment and flipped. Can't remember if it had a bar or not.

Message: it can happen, it has happened, and it will happen again.