jacobzking

lol, you must be 16. you're clearly missing the point that the track coordinator (who supplies the instructors) made me let the instructor drive my car. the instructor clearly doesn't have enough experience to be instructing on wet surfaces is he can't get my car around the track one time without taking it off the track. this didn't have to do with me or my driving.

its easy to use some stupid cliche about paying to play, but you've offered no real advice. i wasn't "playing," the instructor was.

fatduece

So if I wanted to get into hpd, I would have to let the instructor drive my car?Thats terrible. Its not like they driven every car in the world and know how they all react. If we have to let them drive our cars, could we at least tell them to take it easy? Though that will probably upset them, since they cant abuse a car they dont even own.

jacobzking

thats how it is out here. i wouldn't worry to much about it happening to you. like i said before, the chief instructor who has done HPDEs for 19 years has never in 19 years seen this happen... because it shouldn't. there's no real reason why the guy should have wrecked my car other than he was being careless.

so with that said, if you want to go do HPDEs... go do it and don't worry about this happening. it can, but its VERY unlikely.

as far as him not knowing how the car drives, that's really not an excuse. for the most car, FF cars drive like FF cars. FR cars drive like FR cars, MR cars drive like MR cars... for the most part.

normally instructors won't have any problem getting behind the wheel of just about anything with 4 wheels.

but I do like the advice someone here gave me... tell the instructor "you brake it, you buy it" up front so its not an issue. they may disagree right away though, and if its a track policy that they have to let the instructor drive... then make the decision whether or not to participate. they are their for their own personal gain: free track time, free experience, free hamburger. they should have some responsibility.

0wn3r

For HPDEs they shouldn't be abusing the car at all. The point is to drive the car and show you the line you can take with the general setup of your car. Some will even say they drive it only ~75%, but that's assuming he/she knows where it is in relation to the 100%. If you let them beat on it, then they will. If it's mandatory and you're not comfortable, say so. Say you want him/her to show you the line and take it easy.

Of course, there's other things besides the experience of the instructor that could have come into play that may have caused the accident as well (water, oil/fluids, car setup, tires, etc. etc.)

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97 240sx se

codyace

As they say in our drivers meetings 'Even Mario Andretti Crashes'


I know it sucks he went off with your car, but at the end of the day it's not (at least sounding) like he was being negligent with the car. Does it suck he banged a bumper up? Sure...but to be offered 2 free track days and *only* have it being a bumper...I'd consider that a 'small price to pay' after having seen many cars crash up big time on track, both on the instructor/HPDE level and race level.



I personally would not expect a dime from the instructor. I'd accept anything he may help put toward your car, in the grand scheme of things you knew the rules and accepted the potential risk. Again, it's not like he meant to loop it.

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jacobzking

i think that's how I feel. this wasn't a race, or even timing laps... he was simply supposed to be showing me the line and got carried away.


Its been resolved. The track is basically paying for the actual bumper (in free track time), and the instructor and I are splitting the cost of getting it painted.

I think Own3r nailed it though. There was no reason for him to have crashed, no reason for him to be driving as aggressively as he was... on a wet track... on a car he wasn't familiar with... 30 seconds after I told him the tires were very slick on wet tracks... None of the other instructors OR drivers wrecked that day.

I'm just happy that I was able to work something out that he and I agreed on as being fair. I think he knew he made a mistake and offered to pay right away. I think that if I had asked him to pay the entire amount in cash, he would have. But I wouldn't have felt right about doing that.

davidpham

ziptie the bumper! and call it a day

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kikcaffine

Maybe it would be more prudent next time to get a stock-ish looking bumper made of urethane incase something like this happens again to have as a "track" bumper.

jacobzking

yeah. theres a guy locally selling the us oem bumper with lip for $300. i've also considered the JDM bumper/lip combo.

who else makes urethane bumpers?

fckillerbee

why are people idiots.

this is a road course. not drift event. The chief instructor said it's never happened in 19 YEARS!.

I'm sure he wont expect it to happen again...

shinhed

The instructor did you a favor. Fuck fiberglass.

jdm213

honestly things happen and drifting isnt perfect and ur cryng for a bumper that i can find for you for like 60 bux right here on the forums and give it to a mexican so he can paint it for a 6 pack of corona .. there done deal

jacobzking

you're a dumbass. its been mentioned about a dozen times or more that it was NOT drifting!!!

and if you can get a replacement bumper to me in TX for $60 then I'll take back the dumbass comment. but seeing how shipping is more than $60 by itself... i kind of doubt it.

Csomme

Holy shit people are retarded. I'm glad you got it sorted out. I kind of think that the thread was dumb, because a bumper isn't that big of a deal, but it was entertaining, and I agree with your POV Jacob.

Def

What club was this with?

It is common in TX to have instructors drive the car for a couple of laps at the beginning of the day at a low speed without helmets for green students. It should be at low speed, but that said, the old track at MSR-C (which it looks like the OP was driving on) is *HORRIBLE* in the wet. Think about the slickest surface you've ever driven around, then make it twice as slick. In the wet my lap times are 3-4x lower than in the dry (on some tracks that only goes up by about 0.2-0.4x).


Stuff like this is also why I'm a bit reluctant to instruct sometimes. It's an almost thankless job, and you work A LOT for the "free track time" that sometimes you don't even feel like "enjoying" after being slung around out there all weekend.


As for someone in their late 20's not having enough experience to instruct, I'm 30 and I've got more track experience than the vast majority of people I see at the track. If you thought his instruction was good, then I wouldn't read too much into his age.


It really sounds to me like you're trying to justify guilt tripping the instructor into giving you money even though you signed a liability waiver before ever driving into the paddock that weekend.

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S13 Hatch - Goes around tracks quickly
DEFSPORT

jacobzking

it was at eagles canyon and like you said, he should have been driving at low speed.

the guy offered right off the bat to pay, but i was looking for alternatives which i have come up with one.

have you ever wrecked a students car?

skyline084

You break it, you buy it.

codyace

Totally agreed. I'm very content staying in Red vs Going to Black (for now)

And that's kinda what I think as well. I don't know Jacobzking and he may be a stand up guy, but I (personally) would never expect an instructor to pay anything (regardless of condition) unless it was so beyond his relm (which when would an instructor ever really do something like this)


I think of it this way...lets say it was in the dry, and the guy over estimated the tires/brakes/etc ec, and the car went off and tore the bumper off...would Jacobzking still be mad? Hard to say.

In the end I think it's a situation of expecting too much from the instructor. I'm in fact jealous that they even offered free track time, as heck I've had issues that kept me from running half a day with some groups and they didn't give 2 hoots.

Low speed or high speed, it was an accident IMO, and I wasn't there.

YES my car was looped twice (granted both by friends), one time causing the lip to get annihilated. I didn't expect them to pay anything as truthfully if they didn't do it, I would have at one point (I was new, and didn't respect HP at that point)

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mr.nismo.

i get where people come from on the whole you signed a waiver blah blah blah, BUT.... if your in a car you have NEVER driven before and is NOT yours, would you go balls out the first lap or get a feel of the car first?

Def

So was the guy actually going balls out? I highly doubt that on the 5th corner and showing you the line. It might have felt fast, but he was probably going pretty slow and likely just got into the throttle a bit much on corner exit. It's easy to do on a turbo car in the wet if you're not used to how it responds.

I've never wrecked a student's car, but I have spun some friends cars in the wet when I was not even close to the limit in my mind (and I wasn't on 99.999% of the rest of the lap). You probably didn't even realize it, but the grip level changes DRASTICALLY on a track in wet conditions, usually going from one extreme to another in the span of a foot or so.


If he offered to pay, fine; but IMO, it was going to happen sooner rather than later with a fiberglass bumper and a low ride height.

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S13 Hatch - Goes around tracks quickly
DEFSPORT

Def

Driving a car on a wet track is nothing at all like driving on the street in the wet. The surface is polished smooth on many areas, and you will have to cross those while driving the wet line. The track surface also dictates how much grip it provides vs. the level of water on it. Some keep providing tons of grip in heavy rain, others fall off a huge amount from damp to dry.

Now in the dry it's pretty inexcusable to drive a student's car fast enough to spin it, but in the wet sometimes you get caught out VERY quickly.


Maybe 4-5 people in this thread have any track experience, so it's pretty tough to get any real info from all the "opinions" that are being thrown out there.

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Beejis60

Fuck that. You break it, you buy it. He owes 5 bills not 2. The track really doesn't owe you shit so it's a cool gesture I suppose, but I would want my money from that assbag.

0wn3r

Exactly how many track waivers have you signed so far?

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97 240sx se

Def

Seriously...


I bet you guys would expect someone to pay full value for your car if they lost a brake caliper o-ring and went plowing into the back of you in a braking zone.



Don't ever take a car to the track you can't walk away from.

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DEFSPORT

codyace

LOL



As Def says, if you don't want to pay for it, or you can't afford to fix it, you shouldn't be there anyway. That applies to almost any situation in life.


With that said, I let almost 5 different people flog my car at the AutoX today. If they woulda looped it, it woulda been my fault, and I wouldn't expect anything.

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240zach

bullshit you cant...watch that

Phat Sliggity :: Zipties

jacobzking

lol... that is some mighty fine zip tying. but as it says at the very beginning of the video... that typically applies to DRIFTERS. I am not a drifter. I do not drift anymore. And that bumper will NOT pass safety inspection on the track.

240zach

you say typically..

the video applys to what to do when your bumper breaks. he was drifting, doesnt mean that you cant ziptie it because you where not drifting. regardless if your drifting or driving hard shits bound to happen.

0wn3r

That last line made me rethink ever stepping foot outside my house again lol

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97 240sx se

jacobzking

you can do whatever you want, but the bumper zip tied like that will not pass inspection and you will not be allowed on the track.