Wrecked my 83 on purpose... October 09, 2009, 09:59:41 PM I am feelin' pretty low about now.I am a delivery driver and I was driving my 83 this evening. I came upon the address I needed, and turned the wheel and hit the brakes... And the pedal went slowly to the floor. The driveway was straight down, and made a sharp bend along a ravine with no guardrail. I was picking up speed more and more heading toward the ravine, pumping the brakes, nothing was slowing me down! I was actually increasing in speed...Seeing the tops of old trees towering out of the ravine, I knew it had to be deep.I had no choice. I turned the wheel into a tree... POW! That stopped me. I got out and looked, and I am glad I chose the tree. The ravine is at least 60ft straight down.Bumper, fender, header panel, etc fubard. The hood is still straight, and the radiator core seems unaffected. It just happened like an hour ago, and I am still in a state of WTF....I just can't believe that I just finished getting that XR-7 straightned out, and now I did almost the exact same damage to this car! GGGRRRRR!!!:punchballs: Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #1 – October 09, 2009, 10:07:41 PM Wow man sorry to hear about your wreck. I wouldve done the same.....the car is replaceable (somewhat) but your life isn't. 60 ft. is a long way to go down... Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #2 – October 09, 2009, 10:52:39 PM that sucks, atleast your ok.why didnt you use the parking brake?actually, its not fair for me to assume to think quick llike that.when my brakes failed on me in a car one time i had to crash it into the curb(it was a high curb) to stop it. i let the pads go too long and i swore that day i wouldnt let that happen again.i miss that car. Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #3 – October 10, 2009, 12:02:34 AM Yeah Id say ebrake and jam it down to 1st but in the heat of the moment its hard to think of such things. Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #4 – October 10, 2009, 12:14:19 AM Glad to hear your ok man.We can all say well why didnt you but we all also know that at that time its hard to think.I have plated it out in my head may times in the Cougar. More than I would like to admit but there have been less than safe times in that car but I had no other choice than to drive it. I have had the gas stick one too many times not to be prepared, but In the moment that all goes out the window for the "OH shiznit!" thought. Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #5 – October 10, 2009, 03:12:18 AM My ebrake dosen't do much of anything. it will hold the car idling in gear, but hills around here I know it wouldn't stop. You did the right thing. I had my vacuum line come off my intake and lost power brakes the other day. I was still able to stop, and I am also temporarily a delivery driver. I fixed my ebrake the next day as best as I could and put a couple good hose clamps on the new vacuum line. Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #6 – October 10, 2009, 07:05:10 AM As stated above,I'm glad to hear you're alright.A few body panels and misc. little pieces for the car,and you'll be good to go.Plus,this gives you a reason to do some upgrades (brakes at the top of the list). Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #7 – October 10, 2009, 12:56:02 PM Thanks for the well-wishes guys.The emergency brake never crossed my mind. I doubt that it would have worked anyway (they never do on my cars, and if I try 'em, they get stuck).I only had about 3 high-speed seconds to decide what to do. I tried low, but it didn't even fully engage before I hit. I literally had zero stopping power. If I had a little, I would have tried to ride in low and try to make the bend and hope to get slowed down. I just knew that even If I made the bend, there was probably a house at the bottom. I didn't want to hit anything that I would have to pay somebody else for :hick:.The light of day reveals that the damage is not too bad. The car took the hit pretty well, I didn't feel a thing (adrenaline helped too, I'm sure). Here's some pics for your enjoyment. Anybody got a header panel? Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #8 – October 10, 2009, 04:23:34 PM Considering what happened, that ain't too bad. Glad you are okay, that is the important part. If you get messed up you can't fix it. You did great, and minimized the damage as best you could with the car. Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #9 – October 10, 2009, 04:57:26 PM That's just a flesh wound.Easy fix....of course,you will need to paint the entire car now. Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #10 – October 10, 2009, 05:49:06 PM That suck ass. I feel bad for ya! But, at least you are ok.Hey... I'm a tbird driver and awhile back I purchased a "lot" of parts. In that box was the headlight surround with amber blinker insert. You pay shipping, you can have it no cost.It is not in pwerfect shape and there are a number of scratches and weather aging... but you hardly ever find them in perfect shape. No deep gouges or anything. It could easily be painted... or simply cleaned up.PM me if interested. Quote from: CoogarXR;294239I am feelin' pretty low about now.I am a delivery driver and I was driving my 83 this evening. I came upon the address I needed, and turned the wheel and hit the brakes... And the pedal went slowly to the floor. The driveway was straight down, and made a sharp bend along a ravine with no guardrail. I was picking up speed more and more heading toward the ravine, pumping the brakes, nothing was slowing me down! I was actually increasing in speed...Seeing the tops of old trees towering out of the ravine, I knew it had to be deep.I had no choice. I turned the wheel into a tree... POW! That stopped me. I got out and looked, and I am glad I chose the tree. The ravine is at least 60ft straight down.Bumper, fender, header panel, etc fubard. The hood is still straight, and the radiator core seems unaffected. It just happened like an hour ago, and I am still in a state of WTF....I just can't believe that I just finished getting that XR-7 straightned out, and now I did almost the exact same damage to this car! GGGRRRRR!!!:punchballs: Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #11 – October 11, 2009, 05:13:47 PM Welp, the rebuilding has begun. The rubber line on the passenger side blew out right where it connects to the metal line. I replaced that, and now I have some brakes, but still not enough to safely drive. I must still have air in the system, or I have another problem too... I am gonna replace the other side too just to be safe.As for the body, I had an extra headlight bezel and tc bumper cover (thanks for the offer 85bird! I already have one though). After beating the out of the bumper core with a sledge hammer I was able to fit the bumper cover straight over the crumpled core. The headlight bezel hides the header panel damage pretty well. The only thing I need to buy is a fender. I think I know where there's a single bird left in a junkyard around here. Hopefully they'll sell me the fender. There was an 83 tbird in another junkyard about 20 miles away, it'd be nice if it's still there, then I could get a straight bumper core with clear markers too. As of now, I'll have to rig up some kind of turn signal since my core is to twisted to ever imagine mounting a light in it again.You can see in my pics that the rear quarters are primered, so I could primer this stuff and it won't look too bad. I think I'll be able to make it straight again for only the cost of a fender... Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #12 – October 11, 2009, 11:10:38 PM Quote from: CoogarXR;294418Welp, the rebuilding has begun. The rubber line on the passenger side blew out right where it connects to the metal line. I replaced that, and now I have some brakes, but still not enough to safely drive. I must still have air in the system, or I have another problem too... I am gonna replace the other side too just to be safe. As for the body, I had an extra headlight bezel and tc bumper cover (thanks for the offer 85bird! I already have one though). After beating the out of the bumper core with a sledge hammer I was able to fit the bumper cover straight over the crumpled core. The headlight bezel hides the header panel damage pretty well. The only thing I need to buy is a fender. I think I know where there's a single bird left in a junkyard around here. Hopefully they'll sell me the fender. There was an 83 tbird in another junkyard about 20 miles away, it'd be nice if it's still there, then I could get a straight bumper core with clear markers too. As of now, I'll have to rig up some kind of turn signal since my core is to twisted to ever imagine mounting a light in it again. You can see in my pics that the rear quarters are primered, so I could primer this stuff and it won't look too bad. I think I'll be able to make it straight again for only the cost of a fender... Considering you used what I LEARNED to do in a Jeep with no brakes, you done good. Apparently, you weren't going too terribly fast, especially if catching so little of the corner actually stopped you. BUT, the best part is, YOU WALKED AWAY. Car accidents and airplane landings are pretty much the same. Any one you walk away from is OK. Shame you're up in OH. I have a left fender from a Bird I'd give you, as well as a header panel (from the same car) Neither is perfect, but more to work with than what I saw in the photos. ZERO rust on the fender, just a bit of a dent at the front end. Wouldn't take much to iron that out either. Quote Selected
Wrecked my 83 on purpose... Reply #13 – October 11, 2009, 11:19:50 PM Glad you are ok, I was driving my buddy and I home from work one day in his s-10 pickup, going 70mph on the highway, When traffic stopped in front of us. I hit the brakes to slow down but was met with an oddly stiff peddle. I pushed a bit harder and herd a metallic pop, and my foot hit the floor. the peddle never came back up. I found myself still going pretty dang fast toward a wall off stopped cars. I hit the grass median doing a bout 65 and all I could think about was the impending doom. We slowed down to about 35 in the grass but where running out of realistate, at that part of the road the median goes away and it was forcing us back in to traffic. It wasn’t till he said "hit the parking brake that I even remembered it was there. I slowly eased it down and we came to a safe stop with a bout 5ft left before it was either the wall or a car that would have stopped us. I still don’t know why I didn’t think to hit the parking brake myself, all I could think was OH @#$$@$R$$#%$#ER%$#%$#$$#$!!! This is gona hurt! Quote Selected
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