My injuries were all caused by the sheer force of impact, the concrete wall had zero give so we effectively went from 60mph to 0mph in one mm, according to docs that the equivalent of nearly 13g. Roger got off lighlty as he was knocked unconcious so his body was limp, I naturally stiffened up at impact = more damage. The impact was side on, ie the direction of travel was right to left with initial impact point being just behind the front wheel in front of the A pillar, due to the cage the strongest point on the car.
As for Hans, well Hans is only designed for fore/aft impact, side to side impacts are not dealt with and in some instances can cause some twisting where the Hans will make the neck injury worse. For this reason I use the sliders (where the Hans straps are not fixed into the top section) so there is some lateral movement but as i wasn't wearing it I cant say I've tested it. Certainly I wont be going our out on track again without a Hans in a race car, it was a scary impact.
Both the seats survived the impact well, the side mounts gave (ie the metal twisted in the impact) but remained attached to the car so in effect the correct fitment saved more injury, I've seen where a seat comes loose and it aint pretty. Overall we're pretty proud of our worksmanship in the car so wer'e trying to put a postive light on the outcome (naturally) but I can think of less painful ways of marketing what we do!
|