Quote:
Originally Posted by Bob Maxi
Roll cage only helps if you have a proper seat and proper belts...properly fastened in the car. That thing was a POS rat trap from the word "go" and had no business being on the track. Safety people! If there is one thing you should never, ever scrimp on, is your safety equipment...regardless if you're only running 15's or if you're into the low 10's or faster. And I'm not just talking about helmets and belts and such, I'm talking about hardware on the car holding it together too.
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Brian, you're missing the point- the car was not a "rat trap"- it was a stock body/frame car with no cage, in primer- just like hundreds of others that run at Pontiac events every year. You're judging the car by its paint job.
ANY GM, Ford, Mopar, etc. that has a separate bolt-on frame or subframe, will disintegrate like that, without a full cage- regardless of what it looks like- you could take a stock $100,000 GTO Judge show car and if it went sideways in a drag race, it would roll just like that Chevy, all the body bolts would break off the frame, and the body/frame would separate, tossing driver, engine, parts all over, just like that Chevy
only the parts would be shinier, and more expensive
many years ago, an Olds Cutlass raced a Mustang here one night, and hit black ice- and both cars rolled- the Olds body came off the frame, the 2 sections were hundreds of feet apart- and everyone in the Olds died.
The Mustang ended up on its side, and the people in it survived
the key is, keep the car intact in one unit
racing a stock bodied car is DANGEROUS, without a cage- period-it doesn't matter what it looks like- the cage is what holds it all together- there's only 8 or 10 bolts holding the body on the frame- and you're in the body.