I'm so sorry to hear about your car, but very happy to hear that everyone was OK. Please keep us posted on how things turn out.

 

As everyone else, I'm sorry to hear about your accident.......

 

hey if ur ever getting rid of the car, sell me ur strakes! i almost lost my rear going into a turn in the rain!

 

Ditto to Aratinga's recommendation. When people come here and ask "I've got $1000 to spend on upgrades - what should I buy?", I always recommend driver training like the performance driving schools Aratinga describes. It will make your car safer and faster - and will make every car you ever drive safer and faster. By far the best investment anyone can make. Forget about coilovers, big brakes, 19" wheels, intakes, exhausts - learn how to really drive, safely, controlling the car at the limits.

TGR, glad you and your brothers are OK. (That doesn't look like 5 mph worth of damage...)

Regards,
Gordon

 

WOW. Sorry to hear about your car. Glad everyone was out OK. A friend was driving my protoge once and lost control head on in to a concrete building. I walked around shaky for a couple of days. Hopefully you have made it past that but if not, don't worry, it will pass.

Before they total it and it becomes their property, you might want to see about salvaging a few things like your strakes etc. If you get another 8, you won't have to buy them again. If you don't you can make a quick $50 or so on this forum.

greese

 

My have my admiration for declaring on a public forum a momentary lapse in judgement, which created a situation which was bad enough, but could have been far worse. More to the point, you've provided those who read your synopsis an insight as to what can happen, given a set of circumstances.

I'm sure many of us have occasionally disengaged the TCS/DSC to experience a bit more power, which is unavailable when "the car has control." I'm no mechanic and probably as ignorant as they come with respects to systems operation for power-distribution. But from what I've read, the TCS/DSC feature is essential in keeping power distributed evenly throughout turns, braking and slippery conditions.

Your experience pretty much proves this. Thanks for sharing. I will certainly think twice next time I want to get froggy around corners, or when I have passengers with me.

I hope all goes well for you and extremely glad to read everyone is alright. The damage to your car would have paled compared to the guilt you would have endured had anyone gotten hurt.

 

I am amazed that this whole thing started out at 5mph and one oversteer, one over correctiion and a 180 degree turn later there is this much damage on the car. That impact looks like at least 30 to 40 mph impact into the final tree. How much distance was there between the trees?

I guess that old addage of Stomp and Steer definitely means the break and not the gas for beginner drivers!

I always want to have my foot on the break or the gas in hard cornering... if I over steer, I want to slow down so I can get the traction back on the rear end... if I understeer (the worst) your only chance of saving (unless you ahve a lot of room) is hitting the gas to try and pull out of it.

Lucky were in a rear wheel driven car and we are more prone to oversteer. Once you get the hang of an oversteer you will find they are much more desirable if your going to have wheels let loose.

 

Nah, then you'll just plow all the more... unless you break the rear loose, then you'll have a nice, delicious four-wheel-drift going

Wow, listen to me, lol, I've had RWD for (counts fingers one one hand) four days now, and I'm already opinionated

 

sucks to hear about your car bro. hope your insurance comes through with a brand spanking new rx8. at least you all walked away safe - and that's what's really important.
as for the rx8 fishtailing, the back end does tend to slide out a bit but nothing severe - was the road slick? (water, oil, grease, blood, sand, etc)
too bad that if you had known how to correct the slide you might have walked away without a scratch. well, now you know. maybe a good time to invest in a performance driving school? i highly recommend it, even to the best drivers on the road. it helps you prepare for these situations that most drivers can't predict.

takahashi/dvious - i'd never fully let go of the gas when sliding, that'd definitely put me in a spin. i usually ease off the gas a bit until the weight is about even, correct my wheels and then give it more throttle. i wouldn't recommend heavy breaking ( although a little breaking helps people new to sliding around corners)
but these things are hard to do when you're panicking and was never given proper instructions. most people would just scream bloody murder, stand on the breaks and hope everything works out.
but both of you make good points. i'll keep the dead bodies in mind next time i'm in a pickle of a turn takahashi

 

Four Wheel Drifting Slides are what they make commercials out of! That has to mean they are safe! ~j/k~

In my FWD Integra, I did save a few understeers by having the presence of mind to press gas and not break. It definitely helped!

I cant get this car to understeer easily so its hard to test it out in the RWD RX8.

 

The only way to reduce understeer in a FWD is to reduce speed (and shift weight forward) by lifting off the throttle, or, if you want it to go into oversteer in a corner, brake into it (but do NOT do this on the street <g>).

RWD is a trickier balance, since more speed = more understeer, but more acceleration = looser rear. Lift off too abruptly OR give it too much gas and the rear wheels lose traction and around you go.

 

From personal experience after driving my dads e55 in the rain with traction off...(yes i know dumb move) but anyways iv'e slid it out more than a few times on turns and noticed if i keep my foot on the gas..and counter steer...the car slows a little into the slide while still moving sideways...and just sits there while the tires are spinning until i release the gas and hit it again..than it catches and goes....from personal experience the best method is to let go of the gas...and counter steer....the car hooks way faster and safer....

 

Two scenarios when you oversteer:

a) On the track: Maintain gas input, countersteer with small corrections carefully. If the slide is uncontrolled or drift angle exceeds limit, then both feet in and come to a stop immediately.

b) On public street: As soon as the rear end steps out, don't ever try to save it with a power slide! Both feet in immediately and come to a complete stop. Don't try to be a hero when there are possible life threatening situations.

Please take a driver safety class as others have suggested. This disaster could have been avoided if you had the chance to practice recovery in a safe, controlled environment. (That goes double for all you street racers who think you can handle any type of situation)

 

There seems to be some confusion about how fast I was going...

I slowed to about 5 mph to turn, then punched the gas. I only wanted to make it clear that I did not hit the turn at a high speed, but that reached that speed sometime when I was accelerating around the turn.

I would also assume the final speed was around 20-40 mph when I made the big collision, but I couldn't say for sure because I did not know which tree made the big impact.

My guess is the lower tree, maybe I will take pictures of the accident area sometime and give the proper distances so that the physics majors can figure out everything exactly, (I know someone out there would be up for it.)

The diagram most likely does not show proper distance between where I turned and where the swing to the left occured... My guess is that it was around 15 yards.

Hope this clears things up.

Ah and the final estimate came back today, $20,000. Next up, the time estimate. Should be quite some time.

Thanks for the still positive constructive feedback, And yes I did post the long accident report hoping that their would be a few out there who would learn from my mistake and not have to make it themselves.

~Max


Also: I believe I will schedule that performance driving school whenever I finally get this back... any recommendations for the Dallas area?

 

I can see how 30-40 MPH woudl do that much damage. Look at the front end of our cars. There is hardly anything there until you get to the "V" in the middle of the hood.

 

Max,
Good to hear you're ok and that really does suck. at 20 grand to repair, ouch. The value of the car was at least 25 if not close to 30k since you only had 3k miles. I figured at 2/3 the total value, they'd total the car. There's no point in fixing it as there is no way 20k worth of damage that the car will ever be the same.

 

I'm sorry about your car, what you experienced is what you do to get your car to drift, punching it in a corner, while probably popping the clutch. I do this a lot but it's expected, you can keep the throttle pushed in while countersteering 1/2 the angle of your slide, slowly giving it less gas as you straighten out and want to control the car.

I'm sorry to say at $20,000.00 damage, they will probably total your car, they usually do when the damages exceed over 1/2 the value of the car.
I agree with the driving course, I have stock car and drag racers in my family, so this type of driving was beaten into me early in life.

 

Nope, they want to go ahead with repairs. =/ Seems kind of strange to me...

Value of the car was 32k range I believe.

 

Yeah, if it costs less to repair than to fix, and the frame damage is minimal, you can bet they'll repair.

 

Wow, thanx for the post, I am glad to hear no one had injuries.

For driving schools, take a trip to Nevada, we have 2 here in Southern Nevada.

 

Hmmmm... well, I hope that afterward she's as good as new.

Bummer. I was going to ask you for your coolant hoses. :p

 

any estimate on how long before you have it back? I realize it'll probably be at least a month just to get the parts. Tell them to throw a mazdaspeed front end on it :b

 

Wow !!!

So sory to hear all of that !!!! and glad you are ok..

Question..

Did all the Air bags go off ?

and what was that like? did it hurt? was it hard to hold on to the wheel with a pillow in your face? did the side bags make it hard to get out ? give me the gory details about the Air bags

So sorry to hear about your losss...

When you get that 8 back i would consider trading it in for a 2005. After that much damage its bound to have issues later on in life

Good luck

 

-Side airbags did not deploy, as I did not smash anything into the side.

- The frame damage was minimal... from what I've been told, most of the damage was to body, and the engine. I will be fetching the damage report today or tomorrow.

 

push to have it totaled if you can. It will never be right again.