Cage Time I Belive...

[Guest CB-Dave]

Sorry to go about this, but I've spent the last 10 minutes re-reading this post and really think a lot of this conjecture is just bollocks. Here's some conjecture of my own, which is quite probably bollocks also, but hey, it's food for thought and all that....

 

except on page 2 or 3 I drew from an outside source, which drew from outside sources...

 

Right then, so cages are dangerous because you can smack your head on them. So what's the alternative? CB-Dave, somewhere you say something like, "I'd rather put my head through a window than hit it on a cage...". Now, I can't speak for everyone on this forum, but my rollcage is nowhere near my window. It sits neatly in the seam between the roof and the door-frame. If my head got thrown towards the window in an accident, the cage wouldn't stop it.

 

Depends on how you think really - like I say, you will go to the outside of a roll and be pulled down as the car rolls (I'm hypothesising about a driver side over passenger side roll here) - you would end up being pinned down towards the door, then up towards the doorframe, exactly where your cage is situated.

 

I think the word is "dink"

 

Obviously if my head were to get thrown towards the seam between the roof and the door-frame it would now hit the cage. But is that really so much worse than it hitting the standard bodywork? I don't think there's much difference. The roof structure around the top of the glass is all pretty strong stuff - ok, not as strong as a 2" CDS tube perhaps, but probably strong enough to put you in Permanent Vegetitive State (I assume that's what PVS stands for?).

 

In a roll the glass will more than likely have smashed anyway if the chassis is deformed enough (I can't say that is the case for every one though) Also, the roof is higher up than a cage, which lessens the chance of impact (being that by the time you have hit it, the car will probably have flipped over leading to you being pinned back in the seat anyway) Again, every roll is different, I think you're trying to nitpick my argument here when you can't attribute xyz factors to every crash, as no two crashes are identical.

 

and yeah, PVS is Permanent Vegetative State.

 

I can't see the bodywork deforming that much if you smacked your head on it. Ok, if you headbutted the centre of the roof it would deform loads, but nothing that's structural is going to move much however hard you bang your head against it. I don't see that the bodywork is going to give you any less of a headache than a rollcage.

 

Again, it depends on the instance - of course the car won't deform if you hit it, your head will - but what you're doing with a cage is reducing the space available to you, reducing that space then adds to the chances of you hitting it, and with that comes the chances of being killed or seriously injured.

 

It also seems to me that if you're thrown towards part of the car, it's probably because that part of the car is slowing down for some reason - probably because it's just impacted with the ground or whatever. If it's impacting with something outside as you hit it from the inside it's definitely not going to deform favourably, is it? In fact the likelihood is that it's going to deform inwards which increases the force of the impact with your head. The roll-cage would prevent that.

 

Not so, centrifugal force will send you to the outer side of the car.

 

The way you're speaking, it seems like you think a car will just crumple into a heap without a cage - that is blatantly untrue. I don't know about you, but I've seen enough rolled cars to show that if a car lands on it's pillars it still has chassis metal to protect it, I've also never seen a car where it has deformed sufficiently through crash damage to penetrate the cabin area (and I don't mean an external object, I mean the car actually folding itself in to the cabin)

 

The roll cage will prevent a massive force impact leading to the roof line collapsing, but it will have to be truely massive to collapse all three pillars.

 

There's also some discussion about 1950s cars being built so strongly that they were bad in accidents. I think you've missed the point. The biggest factor in accidents at that time was the lack of seatbelts. Yep, cars were strong and stopped pretty damn fast in accidents, but if the passenger isn't strapped into the car they're going to headbutt the dash (which wasn't designed to resist injuries) pretty bloody quick.

 

True, it's also an impact injury though and without proper correct harnessing into a car that is running a cage (as well as the other precautions), the implications are very similar.

 

Think about proper cars in motorsport. F1 cars are infinitely stronger than any piece of 50's junk, have minimal crumple zones, and yet because the drivers are properly strapped in they can walk away from almost any accident. I think that altering the structural integrity of a 1980s hatch by fitting a cage can only be a good thing.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

And to use your own argument against you, F1 cars don't have cages - should they?

 

You will find that they're so strong because they are a monocoque design, ie it is like an integral cage, however the strapping in and various other safety aids (HANS etc) combine to make the cockpit of one of those cars pretty much the safest place to be at speeds that they do.

 

Oh and F1 drivers wear helmets too etc, which is something i've said all along in reference to using a cage...

 

You're also going way off the original question, which the original poster has already answered - the original question was "do I put a cage in a road car" - that was it, no "do I fit harnesses, strengthening plates, eyelets, box sectional welded subframes, correctly fit my FIA approved buckets and wear a lid before using a FIA padded, approved cage in my car" - the point was "no, don't fit a cage with your OE safety gear as it will probably kill you"

 

No where did I say a cage has no place in a car period, I said it has no place in a car without correctly fitted and approved safety gear used on the road.

 

(edited to fix the quotes)

Edited January 25, 2005 by CB-Dave

[Guest CB-Dave]

To be honest I was hoping for some hard evidence from this thread, not just an opinion of someone not involved in motorsport or crash saftey engineering. Sadly none has appeared, so this thread really is just a missed opportunity for us all to learn something...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

ooh constructive... you didn't follow this link then??

 

http://www1.tpgi.com.au/users/mpaine/rollover.html

 

that's got all the information you were on about, and it is a source I drew from too.

[SPGTi 2]

ok i like the look of my 205 (standard) interior, but i want a cage purely for safety. i need to keep my back seats in so was wondering what cage to go for? 1/2 Cage? would be painted black and the carpet cut around to fit. anyone done this?

jus tips please!  im a little unsure

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

This is how I have followed the thread and would answer the original question.

 

Just to summarise :

 

A cage in an otherwise std car ie interior would probably not increase the safety of the occupants. It is debatable that in certain instances it might prove detrimental to the occupants.

 

So to the next question :

 

Would installing bucket seats and harnesses be safer than std seats and belts in an accident ? (Assuming everything is installed correctly)

 

Just trying to build a picture of what would increase the safety, in an accident, of a "standard" 205 in order of relevance.

 

I hope everyone thinks this is of relevance to the original thread.

 

Steve

[Guest CB-Dave]

depends on what kind of accident - provided they're installed properly with the correct angles on the harnesses and the correct strengthening etc on the mount points, with a proper solid mount for the seat, and provided the accident doesn't involve the car rolling, then yes they will be.

 

If the car goes over, you're pinned up - so without a cage/helmet then they may be more dangerous than the standard 3point belts and seats.

[Jay 1]

ooh constructive... you didn't follow this link then??

 

http://www1.tpgi.com.au/users/mpaine/rollover.html

 

that's got all the information you were on about, and it is a source I drew from too.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Thanks for the mature, sensible response...

 

Yes I did follow that link, I've read through it and it does give a lot of the info on what happens to a car and it's occupants in roll-over situations, but unfortunately it concentrates on uncaged road-going cars (despite the pics of the Escort) and doesn't say anything I can find about the increased or decreased risk to the occupants from fitting a decent cage, which is the point here. If anything it makes me want to fit a cage more than before as reading the paper on roof deformation it's quite scary what can happen when a car turns turtle (the 205 doesn't exactly have the strongest A and B pillars I've ever seen).

 

Look, I don't want to get into some childish spat about this, all I was saying was that this topic contains a lot of opinion and not enough fact to actually be that useful. It's interesting, some good points have been raised, but I would hope that people reading this thread would go further into this subject before actually making a decision on whether to cage or not, instead of taking what has been written as gospel.

 

As a direct result of this topic, I will be making sure my seats sit low enough so that there is no possibility of mine or my passenger's heads could make contact with the cage in an accident, so I have found at least some use in it, but before more opinion is injected into this, maybe someone could back up their arguements by asking Sparco, OMP, Saftey Devices etc if what they are saying is actually correct?

[Doof 11]

Roll at 60mph

 

possibly lucky but as i remember it, it was a fairly hard landing onto the passenger front corner.

Edited January 29, 2005 by Doof

[Guest 205tom]

think a roll cage is definately in order!!

[Guest CB-Dave]

Thanks for the mature, sensible response...

 

Yes I did follow that link, I've read through it and it does give a lot of the info on what happens to a car and it's occupants in roll-over situations, but unfortunately it concentrates on uncaged road-going cars (despite the pics of the Escort) and doesn't say anything I can find about the increased or decreased risk to the occupants from fitting a decent cage, which is the point here. If anything it makes me want to fit a cage more than before as reading the paper on roof deformation it's quite scary what can happen when a car turns turtle (the 205 doesn't exactly have the strongest A and B pillars I've ever seen).

 

Look, I don't want to get into some childish spat about this, all I was saying was that this topic contains a lot of opinion and not enough fact to actually be that useful. It's interesting, some good points have been raised, but I would hope that people reading this thread would go further into this subject before actually making a decision on whether to cage or not, instead of taking what has been written as gospel.

 

As a direct result of this topic, I will be making sure my seats sit low enough so that there  is no possibility of mine or my passenger's heads could make contact with the cage in an accident, so I have found at least some use in it, but before more opinion is injected into this, maybe someone could back up their arguements by asking Sparco, OMP, Saftey Devices etc if what they are saying is actually correct?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

au contrere, I can do mature and sensible but that was in response to a somewhat sycophantic reply.

 

your original statement said "To be honest I was hoping for some hard evidence from this thread, not just an opinion of someone not involved in motorsport or crash saftey engineering. Sadly none has appeared, so this thread really is just a missed opportunity for us all to learn something", which was blatantly missing the fact that it wasn't all just opinion.

 

I've not at any point said that everything I've put is the be all and end all of car safety - it so blatantly isn't. 99% of the people who have read this have probably understood that it is just my opinion and as such they are free to make their own minds up.

 

and re the seats too, make sure the occupants are well strapped in if you're caging the car (in my humble opinion) as it's no good making the seats solidly mounted if the occupants can flail all over the shop.

 

plus, doof's pic doesn't show a cage yet the 205 in it looks remarkably 205-shaped still, no major encroaching into the passenger compartment at all, especially if as he said, it was from a 60mph roll.

 

 

 

 

 

 

This post is merely opinion and as such is not fact, consult a doctor, scrutineer, road safety activist, member of the green party and psychologist if you wish to take the information within to heart - thank you

[Doof 11]

205 roll video, connection might be a bit slow

[Jay 1]

au contrere, I can do mature and sensible but that was in response to a somewhat sycophantic reply.

 

your original statement said "To be honest I was hoping for some hard evidence from this thread, not just an opinion of someone not involved in motorsport or crash saftey engineering. Sadly none has appeared, so this thread really is just a missed opportunity for us all to learn something", which was blatantly missing the fact that it wasn't all just opinion.

 

I've not at any point said that everything I've put is the be all and end all of car safety - it so blatantly isn't. 99% of the people who have read this have probably understood that it is just my opinion and as such they are free to make their own minds up.

 

[/size]

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Eh? Sycophantic? My reply was anything but...

 

All I was trying to do was get people, like yourself, to back up what they were saying with some sort of evidence. I wasn't trying to be narky, argumentitive or anything like that, but reading some of the replys there are now some people who think rollcages are in fact dangerous in road cars full stop, which even you agree isn't true.

 

As an engine builder once told me when I suggested something I'd read on a forum, 'Don't believe that s*it you read on the internet!'. He has a point.

[driversdomainuk 8]

oh mikeyde - something that keeps reverberating round my head when I was writing this is "it's not your fault, it's the other prat's" - and you're right, it is correct.

 

I wasn't meaning to get tosserly argumentative before - mind you, the majority of people on the road are *not* capable of doing anything other than start, steer and stop (or is that just the people I meet on the drive to work!), you are right and I do take it back - not every accident can be attributed to the driver entirely, and yes - things do happen that are out of personal control (which is the whole point in the word 'accident')

 

I maintain though that by driving at urban speeds, the chance of rolling a car is as close to nil as possible, of course as speed increases then the chance of the car going side over side does too, but most of the road driving populus of this country are smart enough to know that a car going at 70/80mph hitting another one at 70/80mph is going to be the start of a very bad day!

 

Most crashes occur under the speed limit (I hate speed limits btw - I'm not a leftie!) and the majority of them are low speed fender benders, the best thing someone can do for safety (and I mean this) is to do an IAM driving course or practice other forms of defencive driving - rather than make the car a rolling teutonic block of death, people should train themselves up more so they know what to happen when things go wrong...

 

best of all - IAM stuff is usually free or available for a teeny small fee, I think the IAM test costs about £40 or so (it's been a while since I looked into it)

 

www.iam.org.uk

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Or even better go for the RoSPA advanced driving course - you get graded Gold, Silver or Bronze and have to re test every 3 years. Apart from being harder than IAM it will make you an even better driver. I did IAM at 18 and RoADA (RoSPA Advanced Drivers Association) at 23

[Guest CB-Dave]

Eh? Sycophantic? My reply was anything but...

 

All I was trying to do was get people, like yourself, to back up what they were saying with some sort of evidence. I wasn't trying to be narky, argumentitive or anything like that, but reading some of the replys there are now some people who think rollcages are in fact dangerous in road cars full stop, which even you agree isn't true.

 

As an engine builder once told me when I suggested something I'd read on a forum, 'Don't believe that s*it you read on the internet!'. He has a point.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

that's just it - they are dangerous in road cars full stop.

 

they aren't dangerous however, in a car used on the road that utilises full safety gear - inc helmet, padding, correct harnesses etc. That can hardly be called a road car though, more a racecar used on the road.

[Jay 1]

That's just differences in terminology though.

 

However, terminology or not, I do agree with what you're saying, there is a lot more to it than just sticking a cage in a car and away you go, but at the same time a cage in a car that's primarly going to be used on the road (as mine will be) that has been installed correctly and has the rest of the required safety equipment also correctly installed, isn't dangerous.

[Butler 0]

Will you be wearing a lid?

 

I have al the other safety stuff, but I don't wear a lid. I reckon a padded cage is softer than the interior anyway.

[Jay 1]

I won't on the road, but will pad up the cage as well. Hopefully I can mount the seats low enough so that it won't be an issue anyway, which will give the bonus of a better CoG as well.

[Butler 0]

Yeah. I have padded my cage and mounted the seats and harness properly. I hope to lower my seats later in the year.

[cybernck 402 1 Cars]

what if the harness rear mounting points are horizontal, or slightly upwards?

 

 

also, it seems that they go right over my collar bones which i don't exactly like!

 

i mean, is there something wrong with my collar bones or what?

[Butler 0]

Can't see it making a difference, unless you have you adjusters on your collar bones then it is uncomfortable, they should be further down.

[danpug 1]

So where is the correct place in a 205 to mount the rear point of a harness?

[cybernck 402 1 Cars]

Can't see it making a difference, unless you have you adjusters on your collar bones then it is uncomfortable, they should be further down.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

no, not the adjusters, but the straps.

 

just afraid my collar bones might get crushed .

[Alan_M 66 1 Cars]

As an engine builder once told me when I suggested something I'd read on a forum, 'Don't believe that s*it you read on the internet!'. He has a point.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

His name was'nt Beric, was it?

[Jay 1]

Charlie Bensamin was the bloke... no-one will ahve a clue who he is, but he really knows his stuff.

[Ogwen69 0]

What on EARTH did the poor bugger hit? or what hit him?

[Ogwen69 0]

What on EARTH did the poor bugger hit? or what hit him?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Sorry messed that up -was referring to Matt with the ever-so slightly bent red 205.

 

*prepares to throw in two-penneth*

 

"shall I put a cage in my car, yes or no" - I wouldnt in a standard road car. Every day any one of us gets behind the wheel we run the risk of some d1ckhead in a land cruiser mistaking us for a speedbump. I for one drive my 205 like I believe it was built to be driven, that is with grin inducing speed and noise, that is why I bought it.

 

A cage might help if I put it sideways in to a ditch and start rolling, but I'd rather avoid the whole crashing thing having done it too many times already (not in 205's though).

 

I also do a fair amount of scatters and things like that and to be honest I'd rather NOT have a cage. When competing there is always at the back of my mind that I am in a coke can on steroids which is going to crumple if i hit that barn/wall/tree/bus/gerbil so really don't want to hit anything.

 

There are always going to be pro's and con's to every option - but remember that a cage will not always save your life. Remember the Kall Kwik rally last februay in Dalby where Christine Francis died? Car left the road at 120+, hit trees, flipped, landed on its wheels. Cage intact, Driver got out ok, Christine didn't but not cos of the crash itself, one of the trees they hit came down on top of the car... She might as well have been protected by a carrier bag but this just enforces the opinion that we don't know our own futures do we?

 

As a parting comment remember this: Drive like you expect to meet yourself coming the other way - you won't go far wrong....

[driversdomainuk 8]

Well with all said and done my Sparco 10 point roll cage is arriving in the next week or so, so whatever anyone says, I will feel much safer in the car on a hill climb with a cage, than I would without one for sure.

 

As much as I love 205's they are very weak compared with moden day cars we are used to.