Well since the word has spread... My suby is dead
08-11-2005, 12:45 AM
#1
Well since the word has spread... My suby is dead
I didn't want to post about this just yet as I'm still in a bit of shock, but it seems word spreads quickly so I might as well fill you guys in on the details.
It all started on Sunday morning when I had the car serviced at a local Jiffy Lube type place (first time in about 2 years, and only because it was 105* outside). Got the oil changed, tires rotated, and they talked me into having the air in my tires replaced with nitrogen... apparantly the new thing to do because it doesn't expand as much as it heats up.
Anyway... at about 2:30pm, I headed out to drive to Novato through the napa/berryessa area. I just left davis and was driving down Russel Road. I took the only little turn in the area at a decent pace and immediately the car felt all wrong. It understeered like its never done before... not even on RE-92's and stock suspension. I recovered ok and kept driving. The rest of the road was straight for a mile or two and no other cars in sight. I noticed a large rock in my lane and gently swerved to go around it. This time, however, the tires instantly broke loose sending me sidways at about 50mph which is fairly easily correctable under normal circumstances. I did everything I could to try to get the car straight and to get the damn tires to catch... they weren't having anything of it. Absolutely no traction no matter what I tried, it felt like I was driving on wet glass. I ended up fishtailing left/right accross the road atleast 4 times trying everything I could to get even a hint of traction.
I finally ended up going off the road nose first into a big irrigation ditch. My airbag went off upon imact and then the car started flipping. It felt like atleast 3 flips with atleast one or two of them being end over end. Somehow the car ended up back on the road, perfectly in the lane, except it was upside down. The roof above the driver's seat (now bellow me) was completely collapsed and the driver's window was collapsed shut. The rear window was blown out and deformed, but there was enough room to get out. So I reached over, grabbed the lever for my seatback, pushed the seatback all the way back and managed to crawl out of the rear window. A couple cars pulled over including a doctor. One of them called 911 while someone else grabbed a jacket, that along with a lot of other crap had exploded out of the trunk, and made me lay down to wait for the paramedics. I had plenty of cuts and bruises but the only pain I could feel at the time was a really sore shoulder. The doctor brought over a bottle of water and helped me wash the pieces of glass off my arms and legs but wouldn't let me drink any in fear that I had internal injuries. The CHP, fire department and medics showed up shortly. Aparantly when the officer saw the car, he immediately radio'd for a helicopter which was then called off by the paramedics. They looked me over and quickly strapped me to a board with a neck brace and rushed me to the ER. One of the firemen barely had time to get my wallet out of the car before they took me away. I spent 8 hours in the ER (mostly waiting around on a gurny in the hallway) getting poked and prodded, blood tests, x-rays, cat scans, etc. They finally released me at 12:30AM with no serious injuries. Just cuts mostly from crawling out of the car and bruises and a sprained shoulder from the seatbelt.
A friend of mine who I called from the hospital went to check where the car was being towed. He said that he looked all over the road and didn't see a single skid mark ANYWHERE. My suspicion is that the shop severely overinflated my tires, causing them to lose all of their traction characteristics (these were S03's with decent tread btw). Sadly, I have no way of proving this as the tires were blown out from the impact. The fact that there wasn't a single skid mark in sight, however, shows that the tires weren't even close to gripping and I honestly don't know what other factors could cause these tires to suddenly act like total crap.
The next day I went to the tow yard where my car was being stored to get some personal belongings out of it. The guys working there couldn't believe I was the driver.... the car looked like a completely mangled pancake. I consider myself extremely lucky to have gotten out of such an accident with only minor injuries and am very thankful to the Subaru which I believe saved my life.
I realize this may seem like a noob driving mistake, but my account of it is exaclty what happened. I've been in plenty of slide situations both on gravel and tarmac and while I won't claim to be the best driver out there, I generally know how to handle my car and how to get out of hairy situations, so while there may have been something I could have done better to recover, considering the circumstances, I honestly don't think this was a case of a major driver error. Of course you guys are free to decide for yourselves. I'm just thankful to be alive.
Thanks
It all started on Sunday morning when I had the car serviced at a local Jiffy Lube type place (first time in about 2 years, and only because it was 105* outside). Got the oil changed, tires rotated, and they talked me into having the air in my tires replaced with nitrogen... apparantly the new thing to do because it doesn't expand as much as it heats up.
Anyway... at about 2:30pm, I headed out to drive to Novato through the napa/berryessa area. I just left davis and was driving down Russel Road. I took the only little turn in the area at a decent pace and immediately the car felt all wrong. It understeered like its never done before... not even on RE-92's and stock suspension. I recovered ok and kept driving. The rest of the road was straight for a mile or two and no other cars in sight. I noticed a large rock in my lane and gently swerved to go around it. This time, however, the tires instantly broke loose sending me sidways at about 50mph which is fairly easily correctable under normal circumstances. I did everything I could to try to get the car straight and to get the damn tires to catch... they weren't having anything of it. Absolutely no traction no matter what I tried, it felt like I was driving on wet glass. I ended up fishtailing left/right accross the road atleast 4 times trying everything I could to get even a hint of traction.
I finally ended up going off the road nose first into a big irrigation ditch. My airbag went off upon imact and then the car started flipping. It felt like atleast 3 flips with atleast one or two of them being end over end. Somehow the car ended up back on the road, perfectly in the lane, except it was upside down. The roof above the driver's seat (now bellow me) was completely collapsed and the driver's window was collapsed shut. The rear window was blown out and deformed, but there was enough room to get out. So I reached over, grabbed the lever for my seatback, pushed the seatback all the way back and managed to crawl out of the rear window. A couple cars pulled over including a doctor. One of them called 911 while someone else grabbed a jacket, that along with a lot of other crap had exploded out of the trunk, and made me lay down to wait for the paramedics. I had plenty of cuts and bruises but the only pain I could feel at the time was a really sore shoulder. The doctor brought over a bottle of water and helped me wash the pieces of glass off my arms and legs but wouldn't let me drink any in fear that I had internal injuries. The CHP, fire department and medics showed up shortly. Aparantly when the officer saw the car, he immediately radio'd for a helicopter which was then called off by the paramedics. They looked me over and quickly strapped me to a board with a neck brace and rushed me to the ER. One of the firemen barely had time to get my wallet out of the car before they took me away. I spent 8 hours in the ER (mostly waiting around on a gurny in the hallway) getting poked and prodded, blood tests, x-rays, cat scans, etc. They finally released me at 12:30AM with no serious injuries. Just cuts mostly from crawling out of the car and bruises and a sprained shoulder from the seatbelt.
A friend of mine who I called from the hospital went to check where the car was being towed. He said that he looked all over the road and didn't see a single skid mark ANYWHERE. My suspicion is that the shop severely overinflated my tires, causing them to lose all of their traction characteristics (these were S03's with decent tread btw). Sadly, I have no way of proving this as the tires were blown out from the impact. The fact that there wasn't a single skid mark in sight, however, shows that the tires weren't even close to gripping and I honestly don't know what other factors could cause these tires to suddenly act like total crap.
The next day I went to the tow yard where my car was being stored to get some personal belongings out of it. The guys working there couldn't believe I was the driver.... the car looked like a completely mangled pancake. I consider myself extremely lucky to have gotten out of such an accident with only minor injuries and am very thankful to the Subaru which I believe saved my life.
I realize this may seem like a noob driving mistake, but my account of it is exaclty what happened. I've been in plenty of slide situations both on gravel and tarmac and while I won't claim to be the best driver out there, I generally know how to handle my car and how to get out of hairy situations, so while there may have been something I could have done better to recover, considering the circumstances, I honestly don't think this was a case of a major driver error. Of course you guys are free to decide for yourselves. I'm just thankful to be alive.
Thanks
08-11-2005, 12:57 AM
#3
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whoa!
jeez another suby down, glad your okay
though overinflated tires, even severely, wouldnt make the tires act like "wet glass" , and S0-3s are way too rigid to deform any appriciable amount with too much air. Better look more closely at everything else if you think it was a mechanical problem. Best of luck with insurance and all other crap you'll have to go through, what a PITA
jeez another suby down, glad your okay
though overinflated tires, even severely, wouldnt make the tires act like "wet glass" , and S0-3s are way too rigid to deform any appriciable amount with too much air. Better look more closely at everything else if you think it was a mechanical problem. Best of luck with insurance and all other crap you'll have to go through, what a PITA
Last edited by Krinkov; 08-11-2005 at 01:04 AM.
08-11-2005, 01:03 AM
#5
Originally Posted by Krinkov
whoa!
jeez another suby down, glad your okay
though overinflated tires, even severely, wouldnt make the tires act like "wet glass" , and S0-3s are way too rigid to deform any appriciable amount with too much air. Better look more closely at everything else if you think it was a mechanical problem. Best of luck with insurance and all other crap you'll have to go thourgh, what a PITA
jeez another suby down, glad your okay
though overinflated tires, even severely, wouldnt make the tires act like "wet glass" , and S0-3s are way too rigid to deform any appriciable amount with too much air. Better look more closely at everything else if you think it was a mechanical problem. Best of luck with insurance and all other crap you'll have to go thourgh, what a PITA
I also thought that even overinflated tires shouldn't act like that, but I really have no idea what else could have caused the tires to suddenly lose any hint of traction... especially S03's. And then not even leave a single a skid mark while sliding side to side at 50mph. Just doesn't make any sense to me. I really wish I could figure this out so I could atleast learn something from the experience.
08-11-2005, 01:12 AM
#6
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Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Fremont
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They probably just overinflated the tires.
They use nitrogen to fill tires in high performance situations because it's more easily compressed to higher pressures than "air" from the atmosphere (which is already about 78% Nitrogen). When you compress normal air, you'll end up with an amount of H2O from humidity which is NOT good: especially in Aviation where the H2O will freeze at high altitudes (many aircraft tires are inflated to hundreds of PSI). Nitrogen won't explode/burn like Oxygen will so it's safer to compress and keep around. In F1 type situations you don't want H2O shooting out of your air tools onto things and in high temperature/racing situations the nitrogen filled tires will retain a consistant/predictable pressure because it's a single uniform gas instead of nitrogen/oxygen/whatever mix from the atmosphere so they use nitrogen as well (some engineers even say it will run cooler, but that probably has little effect on the surface of the tire).
Nitrogen is just a cheap/safe way to have source of compressed gas. Using it in passenger vehicles could be "reasoned" to be better because of increased tire life (oxidation...whatever), but not worth it or necessary.
Really glad to hear you ended up without any serious injuries.
They use nitrogen to fill tires in high performance situations because it's more easily compressed to higher pressures than "air" from the atmosphere (which is already about 78% Nitrogen). When you compress normal air, you'll end up with an amount of H2O from humidity which is NOT good: especially in Aviation where the H2O will freeze at high altitudes (many aircraft tires are inflated to hundreds of PSI). Nitrogen won't explode/burn like Oxygen will so it's safer to compress and keep around. In F1 type situations you don't want H2O shooting out of your air tools onto things and in high temperature/racing situations the nitrogen filled tires will retain a consistant/predictable pressure because it's a single uniform gas instead of nitrogen/oxygen/whatever mix from the atmosphere so they use nitrogen as well (some engineers even say it will run cooler, but that probably has little effect on the surface of the tire).
Nitrogen is just a cheap/safe way to have source of compressed gas. Using it in passenger vehicles could be "reasoned" to be better because of increased tire life (oxidation...whatever), but not worth it or necessary.
Really glad to hear you ended up without any serious injuries.
08-11-2005, 02:16 AM
#10
Originally Posted by jc5d5d
Hmmm...this sounds so mysterious..Were there oil on your tires??
Last edited by MethodBuilt; 08-11-2005 at 02:18 AM.
08-11-2005, 02:22 AM
#11
how long were you driving from where you departed to when you wrecked? it could be expantion in the tire, while a tire is under inflated. If it was for a long time your tire couldhave heated up and under normal opperation with regular air the air would compensate for the expantion in rubber but you had Nitrogyn so it didnt compensate. There for under inflated + no help from Nitro. = tires becoming very low pressured and u loseing traction.
as for skid marks, When Im at a track I dont see very many skidmarks from me squeelin through a turn, it prolly has something to do with the type of tarmac, and conditions, it probably had moisture on it.
All of this can be wrong, I am assuming all of this, but hey, just glad you ok.
as for skid marks, When Im at a track I dont see very many skidmarks from me squeelin through a turn, it prolly has something to do with the type of tarmac, and conditions, it probably had moisture on it.
All of this can be wrong, I am assuming all of this, but hey, just glad you ok.
Last edited by Fatal Velocity; 08-11-2005 at 02:25 AM. Reason: I cant spell for crap!
08-11-2005, 02:30 AM
#12
I was on the road for no more than 5 minutes before this happened. With normal air, when the tire heats up, the air inside is actually what expands and increases the tire pressure. At the same time, the rubber heats up and becomes more sticky. The nitrogen is supposed to maintain a more constant pressure as the tire heats up. Generally, under-inflated tires break lose smoother and much slower than over-inflated tires. In this case, they deffinately snapped lose very quickly and suddenly, that's why I suspect they were over-inflated. I also remember looking at the tires before I left my place and noticing that they looked fairly "full."
Thanks for the ideas
Thanks for the ideas
08-11-2005, 02:57 AM
#13
hmm, no clue, All I know is when I went to the track wearing RE92's I had em pumped up to 44psi, and it worked well, part of the reason I had to do that was because I think they have week sidewalls.
08-11-2005, 05:47 AM
#14
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Glad to see...
That you're alive.
Another reason NEVER to take your car to Jiffy Screw.
It's too bad that your Suby had to die saving your life, but in the end, that's what a good bodyguard does. I've been in that situation before, saying goodbye to a beloved Subaru who, in the end, kept me completely safe from harm, even when rolled over in a ditch.
That's why if it's not a Subaru, I won't own it. I don't like even getting behind the wheel of anything non-Subaru. That's NOT going to change for me in this lifetime.
Again, sorry to see you lost your Suby, but glad to see you made it through okay.
Another reason NEVER to take your car to Jiffy Screw.
It's too bad that your Suby had to die saving your life, but in the end, that's what a good bodyguard does. I've been in that situation before, saying goodbye to a beloved Subaru who, in the end, kept me completely safe from harm, even when rolled over in a ditch.
That's why if it's not a Subaru, I won't own it. I don't like even getting behind the wheel of anything non-Subaru. That's NOT going to change for me in this lifetime.
Again, sorry to see you lost your Suby, but glad to see you made it through okay.
