In other automotive news: Man cleaves new Camaro in half...walks away

Jstas

Yes, that is a new Camaro.

http://www.wcpo.com/mostpopular/story/Car-Splits-After-Hitting-Pole-Driver-Walks-Away/ml2JtGU1RUK-Mje-uOC63Q.cspx

Car Splits After Hitting Pole, Driver Walks Away
Web Produced By: PJ O'Keefe
Email: Paul.Okeefe@wcpo.com
Last Update: 12/29/2009 1:16 pm

CINCINNATI -- A car split after it crashed into a utility pole Monday afternoon.

The accident happened on Glenway Avenue near Rutledge Avenue in Price Hill.

The crash appeared to be very serious, but police say no one involved had to go to the hospital and the driver walked away with no major injuries.

Police are still investigating the cause of the accident.

There is a slideshow with more shots at the link.

Willow

Jstas wrote: »

Yes, that is a new Camaro.

http://www.wcpo.com/mostpopular/story/Car-Splits-After-Hitting-Pole-Driver-Walks-Away/ml2JtGU1RUK-Mje-uOC63Q.cspx



There is a slideshow with more shots at the link.

Not any more!

nooshinjohn

holy SHEEEEET!!!

That car came apart alone the welds... I am glad that nobody was injured, but that car should NOT have come apart like that. I have seen Honda Civics snap telephone poles and look better than that afterwards.

nguyendot

You think they'll total it out? lol

how fast was he going to do that? There's no way he was within the speed limit to do that to a car... Remember how fast they had to go to split that car in half on mythbusters?

TNRabbit

I love the smell of lawsuit in the morning.....smells like...........VICTORY!

devani

looks like a local street..easily 100+

disneyjoe7

The Pole WON!

McLoki

nooshinjohn wrote: »

holy SHEEEEET!!!

That car came apart alone the welds... I am glad that nobody was injured, but that car should NOT have come apart like that. I have seen Honda Civics snap telephone poles and look better than that afterwards.

who gives a crap about the car? (if it was someone you know in the accident) - did the honda driver walk away from it with no injuries???

The results of that accident are another reason of why I would purchase american - and why I hope you enjoy your honda...

nooshinjohn

nguyendot wrote: »

You think they'll total it out? lol

how fast was he going to do that? There's no way he was within the speed limit to do that to a car... Remember how fast they had to go to split that car in half on mythbusters?

I think the key here is that this particular car got through th ebuild process with defective welds. I worked in an assembly plant, and have seen what happens to body shells when they inspect build quality. This one failed miserably. In one of the shots, the driver's side looks almost completely un-touched. If I were a GM exec, I think I would be most interested in doing some investigation on this as a recall to correct a defect of this magnitude would be a death blow to the General.

nooshinjohn

McLoki wrote: »

The results of that accident are another reason of why I would purchase american - and why I hope you enjoy your honda...

I drive a Jaguar, and that is not my point.

My point is that the body shell of a car does not simply peel open like this unless there was something wrong with the welds that hold the roof to the car. From the pictures, it looks like it was cut open. With th driver's door open and the fact the driver walked from the car, I am making the assumption that the jaws of life were not involved.

bigaudiofanatic

nooshinjohn wrote: »

holy SHEEEEET!!!

That car came apart alone the welds... I am glad that nobody was injured, but that car should NOT have come apart like that. I have seen Honda Civics snap telephone poles and look better than that afterwards.

You got that right. I side swiped a dhl truck I walked away the car will it did it's job. I was doing about 90 passing him when he turned. Ya that camaro should of stayed together more.

Jstas

nooshinjohn wrote: »

I think the key here is that this particular car got through th ebuild process with defective welds. I worked in an assembly plant, and have seen what happens to body shells when they inspect build quality. This one failed miserably. In one of the shots, the driver's side looks almost completely un-touched. If I were a GM exec, I think I would be most interested in doing some investigation on this as a recall to correct a defect of this magnitude would be a death blow to the General.

I'm really not seeing what you are claiming. That is typically the level of damage that a vehicle experiences when impacting a large, immovable object like a telephone pole embedded in concrete or an overpass/bridge abutment. I've never worked in a factory assembling cars so i can't speak to what you are saying. But I have worked on an ambulance squad where a good chunk of our coverage area encompassed 3 major interchanges for 7 major highways in the area. I've seen what high speed impacts with all sorts of things can do to vehicles. I don't see any "failure" there. I see someone slamming a telephone pole at easily 80 MPH, probably much, much faster.

bigaudiofanatic

Jstas, your not hearing us a honda civic can smash into a telephone pole and snap the pole. I have seen some crazy crashed this one just blew apart. If there was a passenger he would be dead. The car is suppose to protect the cabin from impact. That is how they are designed.

Jstas

bigaudiofanatic wrote: »

You got that right. I side swiped a dhl truck I walked away the car will it did it's job. I was doing about 90 passing him when he turned. Ya that camaro should of stayed together more.

Sideswiping a truck while excessively speeding is nothing like a head on impact while speeding. A "sideswipe" doesn't bear the brunt on the impact. A friend with a similar Honda to yours t-boned a Toyota SUV who ran a redlight on a major, divided highway in Willow Grove, PA and the transmission came through the firewall. He was only traveling at about 55 MPH when it happened too.

No two accidents are the the same and your experience with a much lighter vehicle glancing off of a much heavier vehicle does not correlate to a heavier vehicle than your Civic going head first into an immovable object. I'm sure others who have worked EMS and have seen their fair share of car accidents can corroborate that.

bigaudiofanatic

I am talking about other than my accident.

Jstas

bigaudiofanatic wrote: »

Jstas, your not hearing us a honda civic can smash into a telephone pole and snap the pole. I have seen some crazy crashed this one just blew apart. If there was a passenger he would be dead. The car is suppose to protect the cabin from impact. That is how they are designed.

I'm hearing you and I'm calling shenanigans on both of you. Neither of you has the experience or knowledge that can qualify you to make the claims you are making. I know I certainly don't. Just because I've mopped up after a few accidents in my time doesn't qualify me either. Just because YOU got lucky doesn't mean this Camaro was put together poorly. But I'll tell ya, from what I've seen in the way of accidents, you're both off your rockers.

ben62670

baf please tell the audience how many years you have been driving.
Thanks
Ben

nooshinjohn

Jstas wrote: »

I've seen what high speed impacts with all sorts of things can do to vehicles. I don't see any "failure" there. I see someone slamming a telephone pole at easily 80 MPH, probably much, much faster.

At 80 mph, that pole would have at least moved a bit. I used to ride shotgun back in the day when my Stepfather drove tow trucks, so I know a bit about where you are coming from. The forces here were immense to say the least. All I am saying is I would think the car would have collapsed around the pole. The pole, being somewhat flexible would have bounced the car back and away from it even by a foot or two. The body of the car in this case offered zero resistance to the impact, more like it was hit by a train.

shack

I don't care who made that vehicle...Japanese, American or Martian...the driver is one of the luckiest individuals on the face of the earth. That is as close to an unsurvivable impact as you will ever see.

NotaSuv

bigaudiofanatic wrote: »

You got that right. I side swiped a dhl truck I walked away the car will it did it's job. I was doing about 90 passing him when he turned. Ya that camaro should of stayed together more.


You were doing 90 and passing in what looks like a residential area? :eek:

bobman1235

I have a hard time believing this as well. Someone above mentioned the Mythbusters episode where they tried to split a car in half. i know Mythbusters is by no means a definitive resource, but they had a sharpened steel faux plow blade and much smaller car hit it at 100 MPH and it didn't come close to splitting in two. Something's fishy here to say the least.

Jstas

bobman1235 wrote: »

I have a hard time believing this as well. Someone above mentioned the Mythbusters episode where they tried to split a car in half. i know Mythbusters is by no means a definitive resource, but they had a sharpened steel faux plow blade and much smaller car hit it at 100 MPH and it didn't come close to splitting in two. Something's fishy here to say the least.

I thought similar stuff too. But go to the news site and look at the pictures. The pole did not go through the center of the car. It went just off to the right. Explains why the pole had such penetration and why the driver walked away with just a boo boo on his noggin. The Mythbusters were trying to cut the car in half. In reality, it doesn't always go to plan.

bobman1235

Yeah, I vaguely remember in that episode the biggest problem they had was (obviously) getting through the block, so if this winged the side of the car and kind of bypassed the engine I guess I could see it.

Gnarly accident either way.

Jstas

nooshinjohn wrote: »

At 80 mph, that pole would have at least moved a bit.

It did. Thee pole is leaning in the direction of travel that the Camaro was on. But, like I said, the pole is in concrete. Add to that the fact that the center of gravity of the Camaro is very low to ground. The closer the force of impact is to the bottom of the pole where it is braced by concrete slabs, the less likely it will be to snap off.

A Fiero and a Civic weigh about the same. The Fiero's CG is lower and it is mid-engined. They behave very differently in an impact. A Civic is almost 1,000 pounds lighter than a Camaro and it's center of gravity is higher. It also doesn't have 60% of it's weight over the front wheels. It will behave vastly different in a crash. Comparing this crash to anything other than another Camaro is apples to oranges.

Fongolio

Perhaps they are now engineering safety into the cars just like F-1 and Indy cars. They are quite literally designed to come apart on hard impact. Each piece that flies off takes a small amount of the energy of impact with it thus saving the driver the brunt of impact.

nooshinjohn

bobman1235 wrote: »

I have a hard time believing this as well. Someone above mentioned the Mythbusters episode where they tried to split a car in half. i know Mythbusters is by no means a definitive resource, but they had a sharpened steel faux plow blade and much smaller car hit it at 100 MPH and it didn't come close to splitting in two. Something's fishy here to say the least.

I saw that one too.

concealer404

I hit a telephone pole in a 1987 Honda CRX Si at 80mph a few years ago. (Yes, i was being stupid) An axle snapped on a 3-4 upshift (drag radials + 150shot nitrous + junkyard stock axles = fail). The car didn't split in half, and i walked away.

John30_30

That's Hand-of-God. The car failed. By all rights the guy should have been cut in half also. imho.

ohskigod

yeah, the driver lived. the way the car is cut it's not surprising.....driver seat is intact. It's not a testament to the way american cars are built in any way though, as if there was a passenger in the passenger seat, they would be scraping him up with a putty knife right now

nooshinjohn

I saved this image and am looking at it on a much larger format. It is clear that the car separated along the welds in the roof area. The car is also splayed open across the front rather than the front fenders being pulled in towards each other as would be expected. Even the firewall and I-beam inside the dash are ripped in half. I understand a bit about the forces insolved from having been at the scene of perhaps 1000 wrecks. It is clear to me that this car FAILED it's primary design purpose of protecting the passenger. GM dodged a bullet here that nobody was killed, but it does have deeper implications as to the quality of the new Camaro and how many more are out there with poorly welded body structures.

Systems

NotaSuv wrote: »

bigaudiofanatic wrote: »

You got that right. I side swiped a dhl truck I walked away the car will it did it's job. I was doing about 90 passing him when he turned. Ya that camaro should of stayed together more.


You were doing 90 and passing in what looks like a residential area? :eek:

My thoughts exactly!!