Very scary one this afternoon, my wife lost control of my BM at about 50mph on a long wet corner. Hit a van coming the other way, I arrived to find her strapped to a board with a neck brace on covered in blood in an ambulance, while the Fire Brigade are cutting the passenger of the van out. Turns out she's fine bar lots of shock and bruising and a cut finger, the other woman luckily got away with cuts and bruises too, both both vehicles were completly f*cked, the whole front drivers suspension was ripped out of mine and the footwell crushed in.

Thank god she was driving my 5 Series, not her little Rover. Shame I've just spent a grand on it in the last week......Bloody airbag didn't go off, A&E doc said this was normal, loads of them fail.

Greasy roads after a lot dry spell - keep those Locosts at home......

Really glad your wife's ok Jasper. Must have been a huge shock for you (both).

Cars are easily replaced, (even Locosts!) but we're very fragile when it comes down to it.

Damn strong car the Beemer. Shame about that airbag though

I got rear ended on the motorway few weeks back, dosen't half shake you up.

Traffic cop was telling me that they didn't see many air bags that had gone off, something to to do with them only being set for certain angles of impact.

Get well soon Mrs Jasper!

Cheers

Chris

Sorry to hear that bloke,but at least no lasting damage done(except to the motor)
i know quite a few people who have been caught out by Beemers in the wet, luckily they all walked away,says a lot about the build quality i suppose. A mate stuffed his westie about a month ago in similar conditions, swears he hit a patch of diesel though, fortunately there was no oncoming traffic, but he hit both kerbs at approx 30mph,the car was fecked, £7000 of damage. Makes you aware of how fragile Sevens are, although only his pride was hurt.

You'll be shopping for a new toy then?

ATB

Wadders


i]Originally posted by Jasper
Very scary one this afternoon, my wife lost control of my BM at about 50mph on a long wet corner. Hit a van coming the other way, I arrived to find her strapped to a board with a neck brace on covered in blood in an ambulance, while the Fire Brigade are cutting the passenger of the van out. Turns out she's fine bar lots of shock and bruising and a cut finger, the other woman luckily got away with cuts and bruises too, both both vehicles were completly f*cked, the whole front drivers suspension was ripped out of mine and the footwell crushed in.

Thank god she was driving my 5 Series, not her little Rover. Shame I've just spent a grand on it in the last week......Bloody airbag didn't go off, A&E doc said this was normal, loads of them fail.

Greasy roads after a lot dry spell - keep those Locosts at home...... [/quote

Yeah Get well soon
P.s. check your u2u

I am really glad everyone is going to be OK,

Air Bags - I have to explain this 2 or 3 times a day to owners of crashed cars

The air bag is a really dangerous device, it expands at 600 feet per second and is made of kevlar (obviously non laminated). When it goes off, it is for real. Sensors in the chassis legs determine if it is REALLY necessary. If your suspension has been ripped off, it looks like the main force missed the chassis leg and ran outside it and the first solid part the energy came across was the wheel. This usually deflect the impacting vehicle away leaving the driver door relatively intact.

If the chassis had been hit, it would have compressed, dragged the front panel onto the engine and compressing the suspension strut upper mount towards the bulkhead. This would have caused the air bag to go off.

I have seen car owners who have walked from this sort of accident with no skin on their forearms and severely bruised faces due to the bag. The bag usually smashes the front screen outwards with the sheer force, and driver/passenger gets glass injuries from the interior mirror!

I really don't think the bag failed, just decieded that it wasn't the time to blow.

Give your wife my best wishes, good job she was in a Beemer

Mark

Stuff the beamer its only metal after all just glad your missus and the other party are ok mate ! Bloody airbags are waste of time, I stove in the corner of of my Merc about two years ago at 40 mph ( wall jumped out at me on wet road ) same thing no bag triggered
Best wishes to you and your good lady
Cheers
JJ
PS you can buy a proper Kraut Car now MBZ ???can't beat 'em mate

Sorry to hear your news Jasper, glad that your Mrs is okay.
My girlfriend has a Beemer, and it handles like a dream in the dry, but drive it in the wet and it's predictably schitzo.

Glad to hear your wife will be ok mate, not so lucky for a biker just down the road from me this evening ! Don't think the air ambulance could do much when it arrived
Spose I'll find out more in the local paper nxt week
Take care EVERYBODY !
Jason

wish her well.

My 3 year old 318i can be crappy on wet corners. about 9 months ago I went around a 60 mph bend and the car went tail happy. The road was only slightly damp. There were 3 cars coming other way and the car sorted out just before it drifted over the centre. Had it hit other way this would have been a 120 mph combined accident. Not survivable I recon.

I put this down to shyte dunlop tyres.

However, I have seen 5 other cars on their roofs, in the hedge or otherwise on this same corner since.

Although I hate speed cameras, sometimes they are needed and one on this corner could save a life.

My wifes 2 week old megane ( the car with the large bum) has EIGHT air bags. One each side of dash, two down the sides, two in the doors, and two, would you believe it, in the seat squab to prevent submarining.

If these ever go off together its gonna be pretty loud and dusty!

atb

Steve

sorry to hear that mate,glad she,s ok,see ya sunday maybee

Cheers chaps, I'll pass on the messages - better get on to Auto-Trader and find me a new car....

sorry to hear about that jasper I hope your Mrs doesnt take to long to recover!

James

sorry to hear that, glad she is OK.

I was involved in a 4 car accident on a dual carriage way when one car pulled across infont of us and we all piled in. No one was badly hurt, which was quite surprising seeing that i hit the car infront who had aready stopped at 50mph! We were all sitting on the central reservation when there was a bang, and the airbag in a rover 400 went off for no reason!! Luckily the driver was sitting next to me on the armco!

I'm scared $hitless of airbags, i was working at a specialist coachbuilders/design house and we tested the airbag in a buck. It seemed to go well till we inspected the buck, the airbag door in the dash which was suposed to flap down had ripped out of the dash and was sticking through the roof of the unit, 30ft up!!!!!

[Edited on 2/4/03 by MK9R]

Just echoing others sentiments, mate.

Send her all our love n best wishes - get well soon!!

As everyone else, pass on my best wishes.

Just to offer a balanced opinion on airbags, my girlfriend was driving a Ford Ka about 6 months ago when a lamp post jumped out in front of her at about 30mph (well thats what she reckoned). The impact was pretty much head on (the lamp post ended up pretty much where the engine should have been). Airbag went off, and she hit her head on that rather than the steering wheel. The result? More bruises from the seat belt than the airbag. Don't like to think what would have happened if the airbag hadn't been there.

I saw the car about ten minutes after it happened and all I can say is I wouldn't drive one (although she was fine except for bruising). I drive a Beemer 323. Possibly a handful in the wet but at least it is a predictable handful!

Conclusion... airbags do the job they are supposed to if they work correctly, but I much prefer a bigger car with airbags than a smaller one.

Whoops forgot what I was building there for a second... small car, huge acceleration, no airbags... decent harnesses is the answer!!!

[Edited on 2/4/03 by StuartA]

Jasper, sorry to hear of the accident.....but, more importantly, glad to hear the outcome was OK...and that's the main thing.

Please pass on best wishes for a sppedy recovery from this side of the pond...

Erm...sppedy...like speedy only faster...:-)

Jasper, thats a bit scary, glad to the injuries are not serious.

rgrds

Eric

glad to hear the missus is alright

air bags waste of time seen 1 were a guy hit a kerb avoiding an accident, ended up with a broken nose and lost control parking the car in a lampost

reckons if the air bag hadnt of been so sensitive all he would ave needed was a wheel rim

get well soon mrs jasper !

Thanx to everyone for all your sweet messages.Much aappreciated. Feeling much better today, got some wicked bruises though.I was a very lucky lady.Good luck with your builds!

Helena aka Mrs Jasper

I'm glad your wife is ok, it could have been a lot worse, I hope that biker made it too (don't want to know if not though please - been there close enough myself)

Please stop scaring me ! I only got the car today - I'm trying to forget that i'm sitting on the floor wrapped in tinfoil with 2 tonne bullets whipping by