On Tue, 9 Mar 1999 09:18:11 -0500, Bruce Wentzel said:
>They got nothing on the incident when Norm Anderson's DP Mini
>"got some air" at the crest of a "hill", over reved the engine
>and blew up, I think, the clutch. That blew the starter off the
>side of the engine which blew the grille off the front of the car
>and the hood open. It looked like one of those exploding kids
>toys!!
Detroit Region Memorial Day Classic, 1994. In addition to the grille and
hood that Bruce described, both of which went sailing through the air
before crashing back to earth, when the clutch and flywheel exploded, the
starter completely exited the vehicle and flew over a line of trees and
landed on the service drive for the Lodge Freeway next to the lot. Brake
and fuel lines severed. Firewall and windshield penetrated, Norm was lucky
his Mini is LHD.
This incident reinforced our spectator-access policy at that site --
there's a nice grassy berm topped with shade trees between the lot and the
service drive, but we keep the spectators down at one end and away from the
"active" part of the course for this very reason.
Speaking of engines coming apart at Solo events, poor Mal Kooiman has had
rotten luck with engine blowups in Wayne Snyder's SRE Spitfire. Mal was
driving it at the Oscoda BFG event in August '97 when a piston and rod
exited the engine -- and the bodywork of the Spit. Wayne pieced together
another engine for Nationals, and during its trial at the Toledo BFG, it
spit out another rod (this one stayed in the car, at least). Yep, Mal was
driving it then, too. And Mal was driving it during the Nationals warm-up
last year when the gearbox and rear-end lunched bearings. Now, don't get
me wrong, I don't think this is Mal's fault -- he's a great guy and good
driver and he certainly doesn't try to hurt stuff, and to be fair, the Spit
has blown up when Wayne was driving it, too. But if I was producing a Solo
TV show, I'd keep a camera on that car: it does NOTHING that isn't
spectacular. Either it's really fast, or it blows up in a big way.
Jim Crider
autojim@delphi.com
"Still available to engineer your car parts for salary & benefits"
|