cossiegreg1

just wondering what happens when they roll the car, or bang the back quarter....... does it get reshelled or do they just pull it out. if they pull it out, why do the cars always look decent.?

how come sometimes they drive on the proper highway with other cars?
Tbh im not that clued up on rallying

89xr2

They have to be able to drive between stages which are often fairly far apart so they drive on proper roads. Rally cars all have to be road legal.

Not sure on the reshell thing. I assume they only reshell if they really cant save the shell as the cage and shell prepk costs so much money.

Captain500rs

They use sticky back tape and a glass hammer lol

cossiegreg1

if they need to drive between stages, but for example have no wheels, what happens?.

if they wack a back quarter, how come the car looks good at the next rally? do they pull it out paint it etc.....?

cossiegreg1

**they not going to jacko's.....................










































**(joke,does not represent Blueoval Garages nor any of their workers.)

89xr2

They try and hopefully dont get pulled over by the old bill. Which they frequently do. There was footage from either this season or last of seb loebs citroen driving down the motorway in mexico, he'd smashed his right rear wheel off and his co driver was hanging out of drivers side window sat on the door with his whole upper body outside to counter balance the car off the right hand side. They got pulled over by mr policeman who wasnt happy. I'll try and find the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QeA6Wh46iY

Edited as I found the video.

SteveH

There was a bit about it in one of the WRC specials on Dave, (it'll probably be repeated at some point) called "right off or rebuild" where they shown you damaged cars and you had to guess what they did. Some of the repairs are beyond belief!! You'd be very surprised how much it takes to write one of them cars off!!

And yes, road legal they have to be

NoGutsNoGlory

wow i learned something new... didn't even imagine they need to "drive" ti the next stage. i tought they did like F1, with big trailers :P

cossiegreg1

thats what i seen, and it got me asking.
but what if the police said no more driving. would they get penalised?


Steve H, i take it they must have panel beaters etc on their team.

pee vee

there was a program on a little while ago on dave

and they showed some of the crashes and told you if the car was ever used again.

Unbelievably, most of the cars are rebuilt even when they look totally fukked, the chassis is usually ok (apparently lol) so new panels etc and they get sold on or used again.

SteveH

I think so yeh, on a stage hey would just whack it so it works, then when the rally is done I guess they would do any rebuilding necessary

SteveH

So... what I said then

Paulo P

They are completely stripped back to a bare shell and the damaged panels cut off between rallies.

Here is one at Prodrive that they were doing when I went on the tour













The cars then go for paint again and get rebuilt to the spec for the next event they are to be used in

cossiegreg1

i always knew they were road legal, but i was unsure of what would happen if the car was in no state to make it the next stage and had to be trailerd

cossiegreg1

cheers paulo..... its something i always wonderd...

andysfatrs

they aren't allowed to be trailered to the next stage they have to drive, and if they get pulled over and stopped by the police they have to retire from the rally

Allyc85

Not always, in the UK the police wont let the cars drive with major damage but in countries like argentina, mexico the police usually turn a blind eye. Or if your Loeb they will give you a police escort lol.

andysfatrs

lol yes, was thinking of the uk

cossiegreg1

cheers...thts what i was wondering...

89xr2

As said above, if they cant drive to the next stage, service area then they're not allowed to carry on, So this includes getting pulled by the old bill if they wont let them carry on. There was another story a while ago as well about a load of wrc drivers getting done for speeding and losing their licenses.

It's Czech Mate

Try tracing the history of some of the famous old works MK2 escorts to see whether they got shelled or repaired back in the day

I know of several instances where two collectors thought they owned the same car One of the Rothmans was a prime example stw***r was the reg I 'think'

richm

with a properly welded cage which supports the suspension turrets, it's possible to do a huge amount of cosmetic damage without harming the integrity of the chassis and suspension mountings
Here's an example of one we have repaired in a home workshop in spare time evenings and weekends, the photo's dont show the full extent of the underlying damage, but gives an idea

http://www.turnpikeracing.co.uk/race.../evo/index.htm

2 weeks after the crash it was repaired and back racing in a fresh colour. Clearly nothing like as bad as some of the WRC wrecks, but a fair amount of damage which didn't touch the structure, and repaired with simple facilities in a short time at fairly low cost as an example of what can be achieved. With the facilities the factory teams have, the potential for repair is huge

89xr2

Do you know if they ever cut the cage about to repair it with new lengths of tube etc or would they scrap it if the cage was damaged at all?

foreigneRS

there was a classic incident on the gb rally when marcu gronholm had damaged his car and a policeman was telling him that he could not drive it and he was insisting that he could. they went on and on for minutes saying 'you can't drive that' - 'i can drive that' when the stupid policeman just had to say 'you are not allowed to drive that'

89xr2

I remember that, wasnt that a lost wheel as well, or a wheel was so badly twisted it was pointing sideways or something?

Twellsie

iTrader: (1)

and when they cant do it they used to send them to a company called PSM, not sure if they still do though as i have not seen any for a while

The Youth.

iTrader: (1)

think tommy makinen also fell foul of the police on rally gb when he ripped a rear wheel off on a concrete block the first day of the rally once, I think an imp in the earlier historic rally had dropped it's engine oil and he was first car through!!
he was stopped on a road section game over.

edit found this pic of him further down the stage with 3 wheels on his wagon! you can see the concrete blocks that he hit. the year was 1998



steve

xrsi

iTrader: (1)

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=9qJDDa...eature=related

6.24

cozzfather

iTrader: (1)

bodyshells....

depending on the country you are in depend on wether the fuzz let you drive on 3 wheels or leaning out of the car revving the engine from under the bonnet etc.
british plod take a dim view to a rally car 3 wheelin and carving up the highway.

in spain if your carlos sainz or say africa,turkey etc the plod don't mind because they are more easy going and not as strict.

a m-sport focus wrc bodyshell takes over 1200 hrs from start to finish, and a comprehensive roll can take say 400 hrs to repair so its economical to repair it.
its all down to the sums, roll cages can be chopped out and put back in with new undamaged tubing.

anyone remember the focus mcrae destroyed on the rac rally ?? that shell got repaired and is back out rallying and winning , i have a mate who works for R-E-D repairing WRC FOCUS bodyshells for Malcom Wilson aka M-Sport.

Micky The Finn

Y4FMC,repaired by joe as are all M-sports shells.